Individual differences in male reproductive success drive genetic drift and natural selection, altering genetic variation and phenotypic trait distributions in future generations. Therefore, identifying the determinants of reproductive success is important for understanding the ecology and evolution of plants. Here, based on the spatially explicit mating model (the neighborhood model), we develop a hierarchical probability model that links co‐dominant genotypes of offspring and candidate parents with phenotypic determinants of male reproductive success. The model accounts for pollen dispersal, genotyping errors as well as individual variation in selfing, pollen immigration, and differentiation of immigrant pollen pools. Unlike the classic neighborhood model approach, our approach is specially designed to account for excessive variation (overdispersion) in male fecundity. We implemented a Bayesian estimation method (the Windows computer program available at: https://www.ukw.edu.pl/pracownicy/plik/igor_chybicki/1806/) that, among others, allows for selecting phenotypic variables important for male fecundity and assessing the fraction of variance in fecundity (R²) explained by selected variables. Simulations showed that our method outperforms both the classic neighborhood model and the two‐step approach, where fecundities and the effects of phenotypic variables are estimated separately. The analysis of two data examples showed that in wind‐pollinated trees, male fecundity depends on both the amount of produced pollen and the ability to pollen spread. However, despite that the tree size was positively correlated with male fecundity, it explained only a fraction of the total variance in fecundity, indicating the presence of additional factors. Finally, case studies highlighted the importance of accounting for pollen dispersal in the estimation of fecundity determinants.

中文翻译：

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使用分层邻域模型识别花粉供体繁殖力的决定因素

雄性生殖成功的个体差异驱动遗传漂变和自然选择，改变后代的遗传变异和表型性状分布。因此，确定繁殖成功的决定因素对于了解植物的生态和进化非常重要。在这里，基于空间显性交配模型（邻域模型），我们开发了一个分层概率模型，将后代和候选父母的共显性基因型与男性繁殖成功的表型决定因素联系起来。该模型解释了花粉传播、基因分型错误以及自交、花粉迁移和移民花粉池分化的个体差异。与经典的邻域模型方法不同，我们的方法是专门为解决男性生育力的过度变化（过度分散）而设计的。我们实施了贝叶斯估计方法（Windows 计算机程序，可从以下网址获得：https://www.ukw.edu.pl/pracownicy/plik/igor_chybicki/1806/），除其他外，该方法允许选择对男性生育力和评估繁殖力的方差分数（R ² ) 由选定的变量解释。模拟表明，我们的方法优于经典的邻域模型和两步法，其中分别估计繁殖力和表型变量的影响。对两个数据示例的分析表明，在风媒树中，雄性繁殖力取决于产生的花粉量和花粉传播能力。然而，尽管树的大小与雄性繁殖力呈正相关，但它仅解释了繁殖力总变异的一小部分，表明存在其他因素。最后，案例研究强调了在估计繁殖力决定因素时考虑花粉传播的重要性。