Search results for " animal"
showing 10 items of 3438 documents
Effects of marine noise pollution on Mediterranean fishes and invertebrates: A review.
2020
International audience; Marine noise pollution (MNP) can cause a multitude of impacts on many organisms, but information is often scattered and general outcomes difficult to assess. We have reviewed the literature on MNP impacts on Mediterranean fish and invertebrates. Both chronic and acute MNP produced by various human activities - e.g. maritime traffic, pile driving, air guns - were found to cause detectable effects on intra-specific communication, vital processes, physiology, behavioral patterns, health status and survival. These effects on individuals can extend to inducing population- and ecosystem-wide alterations, especially when MNP impacts functionally important species, such as k…
Helminth communities of loggerhead turtles (Caretta caretta) from Central and Western Mediterranean Sea: the importance of host's ontogeny.
2009
We investigated the factors providing structure to the helminth communities of 182 loggerhead sea turtles, Caretta caretta, collected in 6 localities from Central and Western Mediterranean. Fifteen helminth taxa (10 digeneans, 4 nematodes and 1 acanthocephalan) were identified, of which 12 were specialist to marine turtles; very low numbers of immature individuals of 3 species typical from fish or cetaceans were also found. These observations confirm the hypothesis that phylogenetic factors restrict community composition to helminth species specific to marine turtles. There were significant community dissimilarities between turtles from different localities, the overall pattern being compat…
First confirmed record of the Lessepsian migrant Pteragogus pelycus Randall, 1981 (Teleostei: Labridae) for the North African coasts
2012
4 pages, 2 figures
Assessing geographical variation on whistle acoustic structure of three Mediterranean populations of common bottlenose dolphin (Tursiops truncatus)
2017
Whistles are acoustic signals produced particularly during social interactions. Here, we compare whistles by bottlenose dolphins from three Mediterranean areas (Croatia, Sicily and Sardinia) to investigate the presence of acoustic divergence and to discuss the possible causes of variability. Whistle parameters differ significantly between populations, but PCA highlights that the majority of variability is due to a limited number of frequency parameters. Cluster and DFA show that the Croatian population is acoustically divergent from the western populations of Sicily and Sardinia. This divergence could be consistent with geographical isolation, and a possible genetic differentiation between …
Grafting affects yield and phenolic profile of Solanum melongena L. landraces
2016
Abstract The influence of grafting on agronomical and qualitative characteristics of four Sicilian eggplant landraces was investigated. Grafted and ungrafted plants were compared in the open field in the northern coast of Sicily. Solanum torvum seedlings were used as rootstock. Regardless of genotypes tested, grafting significantly increased total fruit production, marketable production, and number of marketable fruits, but did not affect weight of marketable fruits and waste production. Landrace 2 (Sciacca), with black epidermal tissue and pyriform fruit shape, when grafted onto S. torvum not only gave a higher yield performance than ungrafted plants, but also showed a higher phenolic anti…
Dust and grit matter: abrasives of different size lead to opposing dental microwear textures in experimentally fed sheep (Ovis aries)
2020
ABSTRACT External abrasives ingested along with the herbivore diet are considered main contributors to dental wear, though how the different sizes and concentrations of these abrasives influence wear remains unclear. Dental microwear texture analysis (DMTA) is an established method for dietary reconstruction which describes a tooth9s surface topography on a micrometre scale. The method has yielded conflicting results as to the effect of external abrasives. In the present study, a feeding experiment was performed on sheep (Ovis aries) fed seven diets of different abrasiveness. Our aim was to discern the individual effects of size (4, 50 and 130 µm) and concentration (0%, 4% and 8% of dry mat…
The way wear goes: phytolith-based wear on the dentine–enamel system in guinea pigs (Cavia porcellus)
2019
The effect of phytoliths on tooth wear and function has been contested in studies of animal–plant interactions. For herbivores whose occlusal chewing surface consists of enamel ridges and dentine tissue, the phytoliths might particularly erode the softer dentine, exposing the enamel ridges to different occlusal forces and thus contributing to enamel wear. To test this hypothesis, we fed guinea pigs (Cavia porcellus; n = 36 in six groups) for threeweeks exclusively on dry or fresh forage of low(lucerne), moderate (fresh timothy grass) or very high (bamboo leaves) silica content representing corresponding levels of phytoliths. We quantified the effect of these treatments with measuremen…
Handbook of protocols for standardized measurement of terrestrial invertebrate functional traits
2017
Trait-based approaches are increasingly being used to test mechanisms underlying species assemblages and biotic interactions across a wide range of organisms including terrestrial arthropods and to investigate consequences for ecosystem processes. Such an approach relies on the standardized measurement of functional traits that can be applied across taxa and regions. Currently, however, unified methods of trait measurements are lacking for terrestrial arthropods and related macroinvertebrates (terrestrial invertebrates hereafter). Here, we present a comprehensive review and detailed protocol for a set of 29 traits known to be sensitive to global stressors and to affect ecosystem processes a…
The effectiveness of fish feeding behaviour in mirroring trawling-induced patterns
2017
The ability to observe and predict trawling-induced patterns at spatial and temporal scales that are relevant to inform realistic management strategies is a challenge which scientists have consistently faced in recent decades. Here, we use fish feeding behaviour, a biological trait easily impaired by trawling disturbance, to depict alterations in fish condition (i.e. individual fitness) and feeding opportunities. The benthivorous fish Mullus barbatus barbatus was selected as a model species. The observed trends of responses to trawling in prey species confirmed the effectiveness of a non-trawled zone in sustaining higher levels of diet diversity (e.g. quantity and quality of ingested prey) …
A minimalist macroparasite diversity in the round goby of the Upper Rhine reduced to an exotic acanthocephalan lineage.
2018
AbstractThe round goby, Neogobius melanostomus, is a Ponto-Caspian fish considered as an invasive species in a wide range of aquatic ecosystems. To understand the role that parasites may play in its successful invasion across Western Europe, we investigated the parasitic diversity of the round goby along its invasion corridor, from the Danube to the Upper Rhine rivers, using data from literature and a molecular barcoding approach, respectively. Among 1666 parasites extracted from 179 gobies of the Upper Rhine, all of the 248 parasites barcoded on the c oxidase subunit I gene were identified as Pomphorhynchus laevis. This lack of macroparasite diversity was interpreted as a loss of parasites…