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From: davidh@uhunix1.uhcc.Hawaii.Edu (David A. Helweg)
Newsgroups: sci.bio
Subject: Re: Info. on Infanticidal Behavior
Summary: infanticide versus resorption
Keywords: sociobiology, reproductive energetics
Message-ID: <12606@uhccux.uhcc.Hawaii.Edu>
Date: 23 Apr 91 06:39:30 GMT
References: <464@platypus.uofs.edu>
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In article <464@platypus.uofs.edu> rp6@jaguar.ucs.uofs.edu writes:
>
>Infanticide includes any form of lethal curtailment of parental investment
>in offspring brought about by conspecifics.  Included in this definiton
>would be curtailment of parental investment through destruction of gametes
>or reabsorbtion of foetus (Charnov, ch.7).

Eisenberg (_Mammalian Radiations_) offers a definition of infanticide that does
not include resorption.  He  suggests that one might differentiate between the
seeming social phenomenon of infanticide and the curtailment of parental in-
vestment.  Specifically, he recommends that one look for evidence that the
mother consumes the offspring (which, he suggests, indicates that the female is cutting her energetic losses and represents a risk aversive female strategy.
Of course ungulates could not pursue this strategy well, being herbivores, but
they could pursue it in the form of fetal resorption). 

It seems to me that a definition such as Charnov's could be extended reductio
ad absurdum to include accidental loss of offspring.

If Eisenberg has been held up as an alternative authority previously in this
thread, well, a little redundancy goes a long way.