Table 2.
Summary information about pup mortality until day 4 in the experimental study (VIDEO_TRACK).
| Number of Pups | SOLO | TRIO-NO_OVERLAP | TRIO-OVERLAP |
|---|---|---|---|
| Total born | 472 | 308 | 170 |
| Total died until day 4 | 171 | 104 | 117 |
| Found dead | |||
| Day 0 Day 1 Day 2 Day 3 Day 4 Total |
48 56 26 3 1 134 |
17 21 13 5 0 56 |
18 26 1 0 0 45 |
| Cannibalised | |||
| Day 0 Day 1 Day 2 Day 3 Day 4 Total a |
13 15 6 1 2 37 |
19 21 6 2 0 48 |
40 28 4 0 0 72 |
| (21.6% of dead pups) | (46.1% of dead pups) | (61.5% of Dead pups) | |
| Cannibalism events not detected on video b | 5 | 1 | 4 |
| Pup invisible before and/or at the start of cannibalism c | 4 | 14 | 18 |
| Pup visible before and/or at the start of cannibalism d | 28 | 33 | 50 |
| Not infanticide | 28 | 24 | 39 |
| Infanticide | 0 | 3 | 4 |
| Probable infanticide | 0 | 6 | 7 |
| Infanticide range | 0 | 3–9 | 4–11 |
a The percentages of cannibalised pups between parentheses correspond to the ratio between the total number of pups cannibalised divided by the total number of pups found dead until day 4. b Pup missing between two cage checks but cannibalism events not detected on video analyses. c Cannibalism events detected but pup invisible before and at the start of the cannibalism event, preventing from seeing whether the pup was alive or not at the start of the cannibalism event. d Pup visible before and/or at the start of cannibalism and it was thus possible to detect whether it was dead at the start of cannibalism event (i.e., “Not infanticide”) or alive and actively killed by the cannibalistic mice (i.e., “Infanticide”). On certain occasions, some cues suggested that the pup was actively killed but the video sequence was not clear enough to confirm this (i.e., “Probable infanticide”). The infanticide range indicate the minimum (i.e., “Infanticide” only) and the maximum (i.e., “Infanticide” + “Probable infanticide”) number of plausible infanticides.