Effect of water temperature on the courtship behavior of the Alpine newt Triturus alpestris

Behavioural plasticity in activity and sexual interactions in a social lizard at high environmental temperatures

Sexual selection often shapes social behavioural activities, such as movement in the environment to find possible partners, performance of displays to signal dominance and courtship behaviours. Such activities may be negatively influenced by increasing temperatures, especially in ectotherms, because individuals either have to withstand the unfavourable condition or are forced to allocate more time to thermoregulation by increasing shelter seeking behaviour. Thus, they "miss" opportunities for social and reproductive interactions. Moreover, behavioural displays of ectotherms closely depend on temperature; consequently, mate choice behaviours may be disrupted, ultimately modifying sexual selection patterns. Therefore, it would be interesting to elucidate how increasing temperatures associated with global warming may influence activity and social interactions in the species' natural habitat and, specifically how high temperatures may modify intersexual interactions. Consequently, our aim was to explore differences in the daily pattern of social interactions in an ectotherm model, Tropidurus spinulosus, in two thermally different habitats and to determine how high temperatures modify mate choice. High environmental temperatures were found to be associated with a bimodal pattern in daily activity, which was closely linked to the daily variations in the thermal quality of the habitat; whereas the pattern and frequency of social displays showed less plasticity. The time allocated to mate choice generally decreased with increasing temperature since individuals increased the use of thermal refuges; this result supports the hypothesis of "missed opportunities". Moreover, at high temperatures, both sexes showed changes in mate selection dynamics, with females possibly "rushing" mate choice and males showing an increase in intermale variability of reproductive displays. In our ectotherm model, plastic adjustments in the behavioural activity pattern induced by high temperatures, plus the modification of the displays during courtship may ultimately modify mate choice patterns and sexual selection dynamics.

Diving in hot water: a meta-analytic review of how diving vertebrate ectotherms will fare in a warmer world

Diving ectothermic vertebrates are an important component of many aquatic ecosystems, but the threat of climate warming is particularly salient to this group. Dive durations typically decrease as water temperatures rise; yet, we lack an understanding of whether this trend is apparent in all diving ectotherms and how this group will fare under climate warming. We compiled data from 27 studies on 20 ectothermic vertebrate species to quantify the effect of temperature on dive durations. Using meta-analytic approaches, we show that, on average, dive durations decreased by 11% with every 1°C increase in water temperature. Larger increases in temperature (e.g. +3°C versus +8-9°C) exerted stronger effects on dive durations. Although species that respire bimodally are projected to be more resilient to the effects of temperature on dive durations than purely aerial breathers, we found no significant difference between these groups. Body mass had a weak impact on mean dive durations, with smaller divers being impacted by temperature more strongly. Few studies have examined thermal phenotypic plasticity (N=4) in diving ectotherms, and all report limited plasticity. Average water temperatures in marine and freshwater habitats are projected to increase between 1.5 and 4°C in the next century, and our data suggest that this magnitude of warming could translate to substantial decreases in dive durations, by approximately 16-44%. Together, these data shed light on an overlooked threat to diving ectothermic vertebrates and suggest that time available for underwater activities, such as predator avoidance and foraging, may be shortened under future warming.

Dietary stress increases the total opportunity for sexual selection and modifies selection on condition-dependent traits

Although it is often expected that adverse environmental conditions depress the expression of condition-dependent sexually selected traits, the full consequences of environmental change for the action of sexual selection, in terms of the opportunity for total sexual selection and patterns of phenotypic selection, are unknown. Here we show that dietary stress in guppies, Poecilia reticulata, reduces the expression of several sexually selected traits and increases the opportunity for total sexual selection (standardized variance in reproductive success) in males. Furthermore, our results show that dietary stress modulates the relative importance of precopulatory (mating success) and postcopulatory (relative fertilization success) sexual selection, and that the form of multivariate sexual selection (linear vs. nonlinear) depends on dietary regime. Overall, our results are consistent with a pattern of heightened directional selection on condition-dependent sexually selected traits under environmental stress, and underscore the importance of sexual selection in shaping adaptation in a changing world.

The effect of water temperature on routine swimming behaviour of new born guppies (Poecilia reticulata)

Guppies have successfully established populations in places with thermal regimes very different from the Tropical conditions in their native range. This indicates a remarkable capacity for thermal adaptation. Given their vulnerability to predation as juveniles, acute changes in temperature, which can alter predator-prey relationships, can impact juvenile survival and have amplified consequences at the population level. To understand how temperature may impact juvenile survival and gain insight into their success as an invasive species, we researched the effect of acute temperature changes on the routine swimming behaviour of juvenile guppies. Using a novel 3-dimensional tracking technique, we calculated 4 routine swimming parameters, speed, depth, and variation in speed or depth, at 6 different test temperatures (17, 20, 23, 26, 29, or 32°C). These temperatures cover their natural thermal range and also extended past it in order to include upper and lower thermal limits. Using model selection, we found that body length and temperature had a significant positive relationship with speed. Variation in speed decreased with rising temperatures and fish swam slightly closer to the bottom at higher temperatures. All juveniles increased variation in depth at higher temperatures, though larger individuals maintained slightly more consistent depths. Our results indicate that guppies have a large thermal range and show substantial plasticity in routine swimming behaviours, which may account for their success as an invasive species.

Temperature preference during forelimb regeneration in the red-spotted newt Notophthalmus viridescens

Red-spotted newts (Notophthalmus viridescens) are model organisms for regenerative research. These animals can regenerate limbs, tails, jaws, spinal cords, as well as the lens of the eye. Newts are small ectotherms that are aquatic as adults; as ectotherms, they naturally conform to the temperature of their surroundings. Environmental temperatures, however, can increase or decrease the red-spotted newt's metabolic processes, including their rate of tissue regeneration; whether an optimal temperature for this rate of regeneration exists is unknown. However, newts do exhibit behavioral preferences for certain temperatures, and these thermal preferences can change with season or with acclimation. Given this flexibility in behavioral thermoregulation, we hypothesized that the process of tissue regeneration could also affect thermal preference, given the metabolic costs or altered temperature sensitivities of tissue regrowth. It was predicted that regenerating newts would select an environmental temperature that maximized the rate of regeneration, however, this prediction was not fully supported. Thermal preference trials revealed that newts consistently selected temperatures between 24 and 25°C throughout regeneration. This temperature selection was warmer than that of uninjured conspecifics, but was lower than temperatures that would have further augmented the rate of regeneration. Interestingly, regenerating newts maintained a more stable temperature preference than sham newts, suggesting that accuracy in thermoregulation may be more important to regenerating individuals, than to noninjured individuals.