polygyny

Most such species exhibit polygyny, in which males have multiple partners. Some examples include the red-winged blackbird (Agelaius phoeniceus) and house wren (Troglodytes aedon) in North America and the great reed warbler (Acrocephalus arundinaceus) in Europe. In a few polygamous species, however, females mate with and accept care from…

…various kinds of mating systems, polygyny is relatively common and polyandry rare. This prevalence of polygyny is thought to result from the greater resource investment females have in their large, immobile eggs compared with males’ investment in small, motile sperm.

In a number of polygynous (mating of one male with more than one female) and promiscuous species, adult females outnumber adult males, sometimes by a factor of five or more. It has been erroneously suggested that this sexual imbalance is the cause of the polygynous mating system, in which…