Fig. 4

Comparison of the similarity of bacterial communities on the skin between different family members (beta diversity). The parent-parent group comprises all pairs (male and female) that bred and raised offspring together (n = 5). The parents-offspring group includes all parents (either male or female) and their offspring, respectively (n = 16). The offspring-offspring group comprises all sibling pairs (n = 11). Asterisks indicate significant difference between groups (P < 0.05, post-hoc Wilcoxon rank sum tests). Similarities are based on Bray–Curtis similarity index. In the boxplots, the median is the bold horizontal line, the boxes refer to the interquartile range, and whiskers extend to max. 1.5 times the interquartile range