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Shingleback Lizard
One pair in a 31-year Australian field study kept returning to each other for at least 27 years. These lizards typically reunite during the breeding season. The record comes from following known individuals, so it measures how long the same two lizards stayed partners.
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French angelfish
French angelfish pairs have been observed swimming and feeding together and defending their shared reef territory. The two fish photographed here were swimming off Brazil. Repeated observations of pairs tell us they associate beyond spawning, while their lifetime pairing is harder to establish.
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Black-browed albatross
Black-browed albatrosses often return to the same partner to breed again. Researchers on New Island in the Falklands recorded some birds switching partners while both were still alive. These separations occurred more often in years with warmer sea-surface temperatures.
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Prairie vole
A resident prairie vole pair can share a nest and defend the same ground. Scientists tracked where voles lived and tested the parentage of their young. Some young had a parent outside the resident pair, so sharing a nest can tell you who lives together while DNA tells you about parentage.
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Mute swan
Many mute swans stick with the same partner from one breeding season to the next. A field study found that death or disappearance accounted for most mate changes. Researchers also saw some pairs split even though both birds were alive the following spring.
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Eurasian beaver
A Eurasian beaver colony often includes a breeding pair and their young. DNA from nine Russian colonies with offspring gave researchers no clear evidence of young fathered outside the pair. A study of North American beavers found several litters with more than one father.
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Lar gibbon
White-handed gibbons can hold a territory as a pair and raise young in a family group. Long-running fieldwork in Thailand also recorded mating outside pairs and more flexible group arrangements. Observing how adults live together gives only part of the story.
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Sandhill crane
A paired male and female can call together, answering each other in a duet. Researchers following banded cranes in Wisconsin found long-term pair bonds and strong ties to breeding territories. After a mate died or the pair split, one of the birds often kept the territory.
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Western barn owl
Barn owls in a long-running Swiss study often returned to the same breeding partner. Some switched even while their former mate was alive. The new pairs laid later in the next season than the reunited pairs in that sample, though both groups raised similar numbers of fledglings.
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New Holland seahorse
Biologists following wild White’s seahorses in Australia observed the same partners greeting one another early in the day and breeding together repeatedly. Some pairs were recorded in consecutive breeding seasons. This species offers a case for a lasting bond on the scale of a seahorse’s life.
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Oval butterflyfish
Many oval butterflyfish on the Great Barrier Reef swim and feed as a pair, often staying close and moving in parallel. Researchers tagged individual fish and found many still with the same partner six weeks later. They also found solitary individuals and variation in pair frequency from reef to reef.
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Black vulture
Black vulture partners can stay together year-round and share incubation and feeding duties. One study used DNA to check 36 chicks in 16 families. The chicks all matched their expected parents, giving direct evidence of genetic monogamy in that sample.
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Reticulitermes flavipes
An eastern subterranean termite colony can start when a king and queen settle together. Genetic work found colonies that appeared to descend from just one pair, as well as colonies with additional breeders descended from the founders. The picture shows soldiers, one of the castes a mature colony produces.
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