Sex is important for conservation

I worked with a great undergraduate, Emily Mensch, at Colorado State University as well as the guppy gene flow dream team (pictured below minus John) to ask how mating behavior might impact the success or failure of translocations. When we move animals to a new location as a conservation/management strategy, we usually think only of genetic diversity. But what about the role of mating behavior, which may be complex and shaped by plasticity and gene-by-environment interactions? Emily watched immigrant guppies have sex for months. Check out our new publication to see what she discovered: A potential role for immigrant reproductive behavior in the outcome of population augmentations.