Project 2: Evolutionary quantitative genetics in the wild (Post-doc 1, 2017-2019)

For my first post-doc, I continued to apply quantitative genetics methods to study evolutionary questions in wild birds. This project allowed me to deepen my knowledge in quantitative genetics and include a wider variety of traits, while exploring more questions related to sexual selection: i) I studied lifetime changes (genotype-age interactions) in great tits’ (Parus major) exploration behaviour, in collaboration with Kees van Oers (NIOO, the Netherlands); ii) I studied the multi-level relationships between early life body mass and behaviour at fledging in blue tits; iii) I tested whether shared environmental effects can bias phenotypic estimates of assortative mating in wild blue tits; iv) I studied the potential indirect genetic benefits of mate choice in blue tits by estimating genetic correlations between blue plumage coloration and measures of performance in nestlings; v) I estimated dominance genetic variance for various traits in blue tit nestlings and explored the consequences of ignoring it for estimating evolutionary potential in the wild.