Social network stability is impacted by removing a dominant male in replicate dominance hierarchies of a cichlid fish

Individuals with high social rank within a dominance hierarchy often have priority access to resources relative to subordinate individuals, but these rank-dependent fitness effects may depend on the stability of the social hierarchy. Here we studied temporal changes in network structure and social relationships in experimentally perturbed social hierarchies of the cichlid Astatotilapia burtoni. By removing a dominant male in replicate groups, we...