Why are most of Jupiter's moons retrograde?

Question

Jupiter's small moons are likely captured objects. I would've expected half of them to be captured in retrograde orbit, between 90 and 180 degrees inclination. But out of 65 lesser satellites, only 11 are not retrograde. (Table) There's a smaller but similar bias for Saturn's moons, but not for those of Uranus or Neptune.

Is there an orbital mechanical explanation for why objects most often are captured in retrograde orbits? Is there some process that gets rid of small moons that are not retrograde?

Inclination and distance of "irregular" Jovian moons, Wikipedia

Answer 1

According to the Wikipedia article on irregular moons, retrograde orbits further out from a planet are more stable than prograde:

Retrograde satellites can be found further from the planet than prograde ones. Detailed numerical integrations have shown this asymmetry. The limits are a complicated function of the inclination and eccentricity, but in general, prograde orbits with semi-major axes up to 0.47 rH (Hill sphere radius) can be stable, whereas for retrograde orbits stability can extend out to 0.67 rH.

The boundary for the semimajor axis is surprisingly sharp for the prograde satellites. A satellite on a prograde, circular orbit (inclination=0°) placed at 0.5 rH would leave Jupiter in as little as forty years. The effect can be explained by so-called evection resonance. The apocenter of the satellite, where the planet’s grip on the moon is at its weakest, gets locked in resonance with the position of the Sun. The effects of the perturbation accumulate at each passage pushing the satellite even further outwards.

The asymmetry between the prograde and retrograde satellites can be explained very intuitively by the Coriolis acceleration in the frame rotating with the planet. For the prograde satellites the acceleration points outward and for the retrograde it points inward, stabilising the satellite.