The evolution of brood parasitism from host egg predation.

This article focuses on a game theoretical model exploring the evolution of obligate brood parasitism from predation, using the cuckoo catfish (Synodontis multipunctatus) parasitizing mouthbrooding cichlids in Lake Tanganyika as a case study. The model demonstrates that predation on host eggs facilitates the origin and maintenance of brood parasitism by exploiting host defensive responses to egg predation, leading to coexistence equilibria between predator and parasite strategies. It finds no conditions under which obligate brood parasitism alone is evolutionarily stable, but predicts that brood parasitism can invade and persist in populations where egg predation occurs, highlighting a facilitation effect of predation on parasitism evolution. The study suggests that brood parasitism likely evolved from trophic interactions involving egg predation rather than independently, with implications for understanding similar evolutionary transitions in other species.