Fig. 2

The estrous cycle does not contribute substantially to overall variance, of which males have more than females. Static error for all individual females (A, C, blue tones) and males (B, D, in red tones); female days arranged to provide minimum possible alignment across individuals’ estrous cycles; Y = 1 = Static SD; black line = dynamic SD. Males have higher variance than females in both temperature A, B and activity (C, D). Sex affects the accumulation rate of static and dynamic errors across the 14 day data window (E, F). Males have a higher cumulative error than do females, even when estrus is not aligned for females (E temperature, F activity); males in red, females in blue; line is intra-sex mean, filled areas are intra-sex SD of accumulated error; units in static SD of the population. Roughly one third of the error can be eliminated (blue and red arrow brackets) by comparison to a population dynamic baseline (solid lines) to a static baseline (dotted line). Insets: The estrous cycle adds additional structure, so that staging females (aligning individuals by estrous cycle) further reduces the accumulated errors for females, when comparing to a dynamic baseline, by 3% for temperature and 1% for activity; 0% change in males for the same realignment. *Indicates significant difference. See “Results” section for further details