Parents can influence offspring dispersal through breeding site selection, competition, or by directly moving their offspring during parental care. Many animals move their young, but the potential role of this behavior in dispersal has rarely been investigated. Neotropical poison frogs (Dendrobatidae) are well known for shuttling their tadpoles from land to water, but the associated movements have rarely been quantified and the potential function of tadpole transport in dispersal has not been addressed. We used miniature radio-transmitters to track the movements of two poison frog species during tadpole transport, and surveyed pool availability in the study area. We found that parental males move farther than expected by the distance to the nearest pool and spread their offspring across multiple pools. We argue that these movement patterns cannot be fully explained by pool quality and availability, and suggest that adaptive benefits related to offspring dispersal also shape the spatial behavior of parental frogs.

中文翻译：

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蝌蚪在雨林里能走多远？父母协助毒蛙的扩散

父母可以通过繁殖地点选择、竞争或在父母照顾期间直接移动后代来影响后代的分散。许多动物都会迁移幼崽，但这种行为在传播中的潜在作用很少被研究。新热带毒蛙（Dendrobatidae）以将蝌蚪从陆地穿梭到水中而闻名，但相关的运动很少被量化，蝌蚪运输在传播中的潜在功能也尚未得到解决。我们使用微型无线电发射器来跟踪两种毒蛙在蝌蚪运输过程中的运动，并调查了研究区域的水池可用性。我们发现，雄性父母移动到最近水池的距离比预期的要远，并将其后代分布在多个水池中。我们认为这些运动模式不能通过池的质量和可用性来完全解释，并表明与后代扩散相关的适应性益处也塑造了亲代青蛙的空间行为。