Figure 3.

State-related survivorship of female Damaraland mole-rats: in-group non-breeders (A), single females (B), and breeding females (C). Solid lines display the expected probability of survival from each state as estimated from the multi-state Markov model (see Methods). Dotted lines display the empirical Kaplan–Meier estimate of survival probability, with crosses denoting cases of right-censoring. Here, survival strictly refers to disappearance from the study population, and the predicted annual probability of disappearance (mean ± 95% CI) is given in (D). “Disappearance” therefore combines cases where individuals died within their group (in-situ mortality) and cases where mortality occurred during dispersal (when individuals left their current group and state and were not recaptured thereafter). For in-group non-breeders, mortality during dispersal is likely to account for a large proportion of disappearances (Supplementary Table S5) as increases in body mass and rainfall both increased the probability of disappearance (see Text). The multi-state model combined information on 326 in-group non-breeding females, 45 single females, and 46 breeding females (though females could appear in multiple states). Note that one female had been recaptured as a single individual for 5.26 years by the endpoint of the study and was right censored at that point.