0000000001323562
AUTHOR
Tuula Oksanen
Cost of reproduction and offspring quality in the evolution of reproductive effort
Any organism has a limited amount of resources, which have to be partitioned among several activities such as maintenance, growth and reproduction. Reproductive effort is defined as the proportion of parental resources devoted to fecundity and offspring survival. The extent of reproductive effort is restricted by trade-offs that cancel out the advantages of increasing investment in reproduction. This thesis presents an investigation into the determinants of reproductive effort in the bank vole, Clethrionomys glareolus, focusing mainly on two major life history trade-offs i.e. cost of reproduction and trade-off between offspring number and quality. Insights into other potentially important p…
Karyotype dispersal of the common lizard Zootoca vivipara (Lichtenstein, 1823) in eastern and northeastern Fennoscandia
The wide-ranging Eurasian common lizard Zootoca vivipara (Lichtenstein, 1823) is remarkably uniform morphologically but highly varied in its karyotype. Previous studies have revealed two distinctly different chromosomal forms of Z. v. vivipara in the Baltic basin. Moreover, a zone of secondary contact between these forms has been localized on the southern Baltic Sea seashore. Intraspecific karyotype diversity for Z. vivipara and new zones of secondary contact have recently been suggested for other parts of the Baltic Sea seashore. We studied the karyotype of Z. vivipara in central, western and northern parts of Finland. All the individuals karyotyped represented the Russian form of Z. v. vi…
Can number and size of offspring increase simultaneously? – A central life-history trade-off reconsidered
Background: To maximize their fitness, parents are assumed to allocate their resources optimally between number and size of offspring. Although this fundamental life-history trade-off has been subject to long standing interest, its genetic basis, especially in wild mammals, still remains unresolved. One important reason for this problem is that a large multigenerational pedigree is required to conduct a reliable analysis of this trade-off. Results: We used the REML-animal model to estimate genetic parameters for litter size and individual birth size for a common Palearctic small mammal, the bank vole (Myodes glareolus). Even though a phenotypic trade-off between offspring number and size wa…
Interactive effects of past and present environments on overwintering success - A reciprocal transplant experiment
Life-history traits are influenced by environmental factors throughout the lifespan of an individual. The relative importance of past versus present environment on individual fitness, therefore, is a relevant question in populations that face the challenge of temporally varying environment. We studied the interacting effects of past and present density on body mass, condition, and survival in enclosure populations of the bank vole (Myodes glareolus) using a reciprocal transplant design. In connection with the cyclic dynamics of natural vole populations, our hypothesis was that individuals born in low-density enclosures would do better overwintering in low-density enclosures than in high-den…