ORIGINAL PAPER Kinship structure and mating system in a solitary subterranean rodent, the silvery mole-rat Hana Patzenhauerová & Josef Bryja & Radim Šumbera Received: 25 February 2009 / Revised: 29 November 2009 / Accepted: 30 November 2009 / Published online: 23 December 2009 # Springer-Verlag 2009 Abstract The African mole-rats (Bathyergidae, Rodentia) are subterranean rodents that have evolved a wide range of social organisations varying from solitary to eusocial. Due to some unusual features of their breeding and social systems, much attention has been focused on social species, with solitary species being virtually ignored. Here, we present the first genetic study on the mating system of any solitary mole-rats, the silvery mole-rat (Heliophobius argenteocinereus) - a species which is assumed to be monogamous. Microsatellite markers were used to analyse the mating system and the kinship structure in populations in southern Malawi. Isolation by distance between individ- uals was apparent in two studied populations, but not in the third, probably, as a result of barriers limiting dispersal in the latter population. Polygyny was found to be a mating system in this population, where a strongly female-biased adult sex ratio was present. In this case, large distances between the burrow systems of mating partners exclude the possibility of belowground searching for mates, suggesting that the males might seek females aboveground. Interest- ingly, among analysed litters from various localities, one multiple-sired litter was found. Therefore, the results suggest that the mating system in potentially monogamous solitary subterranean rodents may be much more variable than expected and can differ among populations. Keywords Subterranean rodent . Heliophobius . Kinship structure . Mating system . Dispersal Introduction Investigating the mating systems, kinship structure and dispersal patterns in natural populations of mammals, which are shy, nocturnal or with otherwise hidden activity, has always been a complex issue. However, recent progress in molecular genetic methods has provided useful tools for uncovering many aspects of the biology of these species, which may be well known, but elusive and enigmatic (e.g., Zhan et al. 2007; Hájková et al. 2007; Wagner et al. 2007). The most frequent use of genetic methods in behavioural ecology concerns the analyses of parental relationships (Johnson et al. 2009) and has led to many new and often surprising findings that have significantly modified the theories of animal mating systems (e.g., Westneat and Stewart (2003) for birds). The mating system of particular species is affected by many intrinsic (e.g., population density, sex ratio, sexual dimorphism) and extrinsic (e.g., food supply) factors. The majority of mammal species employ systems with multi- partner matings. Successful males benefit from mating with more females in terms of increased number of offspring, while the benefits for females mating with more males include the assurance of fertilisation, increased litter size, genetically more variable offspring and the prevention against infanticide (Zeh and Zeh 1997; Wolff and Macdonald 2004). However, mating systems might be affected by environmental varia- tion, e.g., increasing population density may lead to an Communicated by: E. Korpimäki H. Patzenhauerová (*) : J. Bryja Department of Population Biology, Institute of Vertebrate Biology, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic, 67502 Studenec 122, Czech Republic e-mail: bimbusa@volny.cz R. Šumbera Department of Zoology, Faculty of Science, University of South Bohemia, Branišovská 31, 37005 České Budějovice, Czech Republic Behav Ecol Sociobiol (2010) 64:757–767 DOI 10.1007/s00265-009-0893-4