Search results for "Predator"

The impact of life stage and pigment source on the evolution of novel warning signal traits

2021

Our understanding of how novel warning color traits evolve in natural populations is largely based on studies of reproductive stages and organisms with endogenously produced pigmentation. In these systems, genetic drift is often required for novel alleles to overcome strong purifying selection stemming from frequency-dependent predation and positive assortative mating. Here, we integrate data from field surveys, predation experiments, population genomics, and phenotypic correlations to explain the origin and maintenance of geographic variation in a diet-based larval pigmentation trait in the redheaded pine sawfly (Neodiprion lecontei), a pine-feeding hymenopteran. Although our experiments c…

Diversity in warning coloration: selective paradox or the norm?

2019

Aposematic theory has historically predicted that predators should select for warning signals to converge on a single form, as a result of frequency-dependent learning. However, widespread variation in warning signals is observed across closely related species, populations and, most problematically for evolutionary biologists, among individuals in the same population. Recent research has yielded an increased awareness of this diversity, challenging the paradigm of signal monomorphy in aposematic animals. Here we provide a comprehensive synthesis of these disparate lines of investigation, identifying within them three broad classes of explanation for variation in aposematic warning signals: …

Influence of colour, smell and taste on the survival of the wood tiger moth (Arctia plantaginis) adults during predation event

2021

Saalistajien torjumiseksi saalis voi käyttää erilaisia puolustusmekanismeja, jotka stimuloivat useita eri aisteja (ts. multimodaalista signalointia). Esimerkiksi aposemaattiset eliöt puolustautuvat varoitussignaalin lisäksi sekundaarisella puolustuksella. Tässä tutkimuksessa keskityttiin siihen, kuinka täpläsiilikkään (Arctia plantaginis) väritys (genotyypit WW, Wy ovat valkoisia ja yy keltaisia), haju (metoksipyratsiinista) ja maku (pyrrolitsidiinialkaloidista) toimivat puolustuksena lintusaalistajien hyökkäyksiä vastaan. Linnuille tarjottiin kummankin värisiä eläviä siilikkäitä, joita oli manipuloitu niin, että niillä oli joko hajua, makua tai molempia näistä. Näin pystyttiin tutkimaan ku…

Multimodal Aposematic Signals and Their Emerging Role in Mate Attraction

2018

Short-term responses of Rana arvalis tadpoles to pH and predator stress: adaptive divergence in behavioural and physiological plasticity?

2022

Environmental stress is a major driver of ecological and evolutionary processes in nature. To cope with stress, organisms can adjust through phenotypic plasticity and/or adapt through genetic change. Here, we compared short-term behavioural (activity) and physiological (corticosterone levels, CORT) responses of Rana arvalis tadpoles from two divergent populations (acid origin, AOP, versus neutral origin, NOP) to acid and predator stress. Tadpoles were initially reared in benign conditions at pH 7 and then exposed to a combination of two pH (acid versus neutral) and two predator cue (predator cue versus no predator cue) treatments. We assessed behavioural activity within the first 15 min, an…

Behavioural, ecological, and evolutionary aspects of diversity in frog colour patterns

2017

The role of colours and colour patterns in behavioural ecology has been extensively studied in a variety of contexts and taxa, while almost overlooked in many others. For decades anurans have been the focus of research on acoustic signalling due to the prominence of vocalisations in their communication. Much less attention has been paid to the enormous diversity of colours, colour patterns, and other types of putative visual signals exhibited by frogs. With the exception of some anecdotal observations and studies, the link between colour patterns and the behavioural and evolutionary ecology of anurans had not been addressed until approximately two decades ago. Since then, there has been eve…

Predator response to the coloured eyespots and defensive posture of Colombian four‐eyed frogs

2023

Deimatic displays, where sudden changes in prey appearance elicit aversive predator reactions, have been suggested to occur in many taxa. These (often only putative) displays frequently involve different components that may also serve antipredator functions via other mechanisms (e.g., mimicry, warning signalling, body inflation). The Colombian four-eyed frog, Pleurodema brachyops, has been suggested to gain protection against predation through putative deimatic displays where they inflate and elevate the posterior part of their body revealing eye-like colour markings. We exposed stationary artificial frogs to wild predators to test whether the two components (eyespot/colour markings, defens…

Seeing red? Colour biases of foraging birds are context dependent.

2020

Funder: Suomen Kulttuurirahasto; doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.13039/501100003125

Multimodal Aposematic Signals and Their Emerging Role in Mate Attraction

2018

Chemically defended animals often display conspicuous color patterns that predators learn to associate with their unprofitability and subsequently avoid. Such animals (i.e., aposematic), deter predators by stimulating their visual and chemical sensory channels. Hence, aposematism is considered to be “multimodal.” The evolution of warning signals (and to a lesser degree their accompanying chemical defenses) is fundamentally linked to natural selection by predators. Lately, however, increasing evidence also points to a role of sexual selection shaping warning signal evolution. One of the species in which this has been shown is the wood tiger moth, Arctia plantaginis, which we here put forward…