Helpers at the nest compensate for reduced maternal investment in egg size in carrion crows

Life history theory predicts that mothers should trade off current and future reproductive attempts to maximize lifetime fitness. When breeding conditions are favourable, mothers may either increase investment in the eggs to improve the quality of the offspring or save resources for future reproduction as the good raising environment is likely to compensate for a 'bad start'. In cooperatively breeding birds, the presence of helpers improves breeding conditions so that mothers may vary the number, size and quality of the eggs in response to the composition of the group. Here, we show that in cooperatively breeding carrion crows Corvus corone corone, where nonbreeding males are more philopatric and more helpful at the nest than females, breeding females decreased egg size as the number of subordinate males in the group increased. However, despite the smaller investment in egg size, fledglings' weight increased in groups with more male subordinates, improving post-fledging survival and indicating that helpers fully compensated for the initial 'bad start'. These results highlight a 'hidden effect' of helpers that bears profound implications for understanding the ultimate function of helping.