ORCID Profile
0000-0002-1040-555X
Current Organisation
Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology
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Ecology | Behavioural Ecology | Evolutionary Impacts of Climate Change | Evolutionary Biology not elsewhere classified
Publisher: The Royal Society
Date: 18-01-2023
Abstract: In a variety of aposematic species, the conspicuousness of an in idual's warning signal and the quantity of its chemical defence are positively correlated. This apparent honest signalling is predicted by resource competition models which assume that the production and maintenance of aposematic defences compete for access to antioxidant molecules that have dual functions as pigments and in protecting against oxidative damage. To test for such trade-offs, we raised monarch butterflies ( Danaus plexippus ) on different species of their milkweed host plants (Apocynaceae) that vary in quantities of cardenolides to test whether (i) the sequestration of cardenolides as a secondary defence is associated with costs in the form of oxidative lipid damage and reduced antioxidant defences and (ii) lower oxidative state is associated with a reduced capacity to produce aposematic displays. In male monarchs conspicuousness was explained by an interaction between oxidative damage and sequestration: males with high levels of oxidative damage became less conspicuous with increased sequestration of cardenolides, whereas those with low oxidative damage became more conspicuous with increased levels of cardenolides. There was no significant effect of oxidative damage or concentration of sequestered cardenolides on female conspicuousness. Our results demonstrate a physiological linkage between the production of coloration and oxidative state, and differential costs of sequestration and signalling in monarch butterflies.
Publisher: Oxford University Press (OUP)
Date: 03-12-2019
Abstract: Many prey species contain defensive chemicals that are described as tasting bitter. Bitter taste perception is, therefore, assumed to be important when predators are learning about prey defenses. However, it is not known how in iduals differ in their response to bitter taste, and how this influences their foraging decisions. We conducted taste perception assays in which wild-caught great tits (Parus major) were given water with increasing concentrations of bitter-tasting chloroquine diphosphate until they showed an aversive response to bitter taste. This response threshold was found to vary considerably among in iduals, ranging from chloroquine concentrations of 0.01 mmol/L to 8 mmol/L. We next investigated whether the response threshold influenced the consumption of defended prey during avoidance learning by presenting birds with novel palatable and defended prey in a random sequence until they refused to attack defended prey. We predicted that in iduals with taste response thresholds at lower concentrations would consume fewer defended prey before rejecting them, but found that the response threshold had no effect on the birds’ foraging choices. Instead, willingness to consume defended prey was influenced by the birds’ body condition. This effect was age- and sex-dependent, with adult males attacking more of the defended prey when their body condition was poor, whereas body condition did not have an effect on the foraging choices of juveniles and females. Together, our results suggest that even though taste perception might be important for recognizing prey toxicity, other factors, such as predators’ energetic state, drive the decisions to consume chemically defended prey.
Publisher: Wiley
Date: 06-02-2012
Publisher: American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS)
Date: 04-08-2017
Abstract: Animals live in a colorful world, but we rarely stop to think about how this color is produced and perceived, or how it evolved. Cuthill et al. review how color is used for social signals between in idual animals and how it affects interactions with parasites, predators, and the physical environment. New approaches are elucidating aspects of animal coloration, from the requirements for complex cognition and perception mechanisms to the evolutionary dynamics surrounding its development and ersification. Science , this issue p. eaan0221
Publisher: PeerJ
Date: 21-03-2017
DOI: 10.7717/PEERJ.3062
Abstract: Video playback is becoming a common method for manipulating social stimuli in experiments. Parid tits are one of the most commonly studied groups of wild birds. However, it is not yet clear if tits respond to video playback or how their behavioural responses should be measured. Behaviours may also differ depending on what they observe demonstrators encountering. Here we present blue tits ( Cyanistes caeruleus ) videos of demonstrators discovering palatable or aversive prey (injected with bitter-tasting Bitrex) from coloured feeding cups. First we quantify variation in demonstrators’ responses to the prey items: aversive prey provoked high rates of beak wiping and head shaking. We then show that focal blue tits respond differently to the presence of a demonstrator on a video screen, depending on whether demonstrators discover palatable or aversive prey. Focal birds faced the video screen more during aversive prey presentations, and made more head turns. Regardless of prey type, focal birds also hopped more frequently during the presence of a demonstrator (compared to a control video of a different coloured feeding cup in an empty cage). Finally, we tested if demonstrators’ behaviour affected focal birds’ food preferences by giving in iduals a choice to forage from the same cup as a demonstrator, or from the cup in the control video. We found that only half of the in iduals made their choice in accordance to social information in the videos, i.e., their foraging choices were not different from random. In iduals that chose in accordance with a demonstrator, however, made their choice faster than in iduals that chose an alternative cup. Together, our results suggest that video playback can provide social cues to blue tits, but in iduals vary greatly in how they use this information in their foraging decisions.
Publisher: Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Date: 25-06-2021
DOI: 10.1038/S41467-021-24154-0
Abstract: Social transmission of information is taxonomically widespread and could have profound effects on the ecological and evolutionary dynamics of animal communities. Demonstrating this in the wild, however, has been challenging. Here we show by field experiment that social transmission among predators can shape how selection acts on prey defences. Using artificial prey and a novel approach in statistical analyses of social networks, we find that blue tit ( Cyanistes caeruleus ) and great tit ( Parus major ) predators learn about prey defences by watching others. This shifts population preferences rapidly to match changes in prey profitability, and reduces predation pressure from naïve predators. Our results may help resolve how costly prey defences are maintained despite influxes of naïve juvenile predators, and suggest that accounting for social transmission is essential if we are to understand coevolutionary processes.
Publisher: Wiley
Date: 07-2022
DOI: 10.1002/ECE3.9111
Abstract: Many aposematic species show variation in their color patterns even though selection by predators is expected to stabilize warning signals toward a common phenotype. Warning signal variability can be explained by trade‐offs with other functions of coloration, such as thermoregulation, that may constrain warning signal expression by favoring darker in iduals. Here, we investigated the effect of temperature on warning signal expression in aposematic Amata nigriceps moths that vary in their black and orange wing patterns. We s led moths from two flight seasons that differed in the environmental temperatures and also reared different families under controlled conditions at three different temperatures. Against our prediction that lower developmental temperatures would reduce the warning signal size of the adult moths, we found no effect of temperature on warning signal expression in either wild or laboratory‐reared moths. Instead, we found sex‐ and population‐level differences in wing patterns. Our rearing experiment indicated that ~70% of the variability in the trait is genetic but understanding what signaling and non‐signaling functions of wing coloration maintain the genetic variation requires further work. Our results emphasize the importance of considering both genetic and plastic components of warning signal expression when studying intraspecific variation in aposematic species.
Publisher: Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
Date: 19-05-2021
DOI: 10.1101/2021.05.19.442026
Abstract: A species’ success during the invasion of new areas hinges on an interplay between demographic processes and the outcome of localized selection. Invasive European Starlings ( Sturnus vulgaris ) established populations in Australia and North America in the 19 th century. Here, we compare whole-genome sequences among native and independently introduced European Starling populations from three continents to determine how demographic processes interact with rapid adaptive evolution to generate similar genetic patterns in these recent and replicated invasions. Our results confirm that a post-bottleneck expansion may in fact support local adaptation. We find that specific genomic regions have differentiated even on this short evolutionary timescale, and suggest that selection best explains differentiation in at least two of these regions. This infamous and highly mobile invader adapted to novel selection (e.g., extrinsic factors), perhaps in part due to the demographic boom intrinsic to many invasions.
Publisher: Wiley
Date: 10-07-2019
Publisher: The Royal Society
Date: 09-2022
DOI: 10.1098/RSOS.220363
Abstract: Predator–prey interactions have long served as models for the investigation of adaptation and fitness in natural environments. Anti-predator defences such as mimicry and camouflage provide some of the best ex les of evolution. Predators, in turn, have evolved sensory systems, cognitive abilities and physiological resistance to prey defences. In contrast to prey defences which have been reviewed extensively, the evolution of predator counter-strategies has received less attention. To gain a comprehensive view of how prey defences can influence the evolution of predator counter-strategies, it is essential to investigate how and when selection can operate. In this review we evaluate how predators overcome prey defences during (i) encounter, (ii) detection, (iii) identification, (iv) approach, (v) subjugation, and (vi) consumption. We focus on prey that are protected by cardiotonic steroids (CTS)—defensive compounds that are found in a wide range of taxa, and that have a specific physiological target. In this system, coevolution is well characterized between specialist insect herbivores and their host plants but evidence for coevolution between CTS-defended prey and their predators has received less attention. Using the predation sequence framework, we organize 574 studies reporting predators overcoming CTS defences, integrate these counter-strategies across biological levels of organization, and discuss the costs and benefits of attacking CTS-defended prey. We show that distinct lineages of predators have evolved dissecting behaviour, changes in perception of risk and of taste perception, and target-site insensitivity. We draw attention to biochemical, hormonal and microbiological strategies that have yet to be investigated as predator counter-adaptations to CTS defences. We show that the predation sequence framework will be useful for organizing future studies of chemically mediated systems and coevolution.
Publisher: Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
Date: 10-12-2021
DOI: 10.1101/2021.12.08.471400
Abstract: In a variety of aposematic species, the conspicuousness of an in idual’s warning signal and the quantity of its chemical defence are positively correlated. This apparent honest signalling is predicted by resource competition models which assume that the production and maintenance of aposematic defences compete for access to antioxidant molecules that have dual functions as pigments and in protecting against oxidative damage. We raised monarch butterflies ( Danaus plexippus ) on their milkweed host-plants (Apocynaceae) with increasing quantities of cardenolides to test whether (1) the sequestration of secondary defences is associated with costs in the form of oxidative lipid damage and reduced antioxidant defences and (2) that reduced oxidative state can decrease the capacity of in iduals to produce aposematic displays. In male monarchs conspicuousness was explained by an interaction between oxidative damage and sequestration: males with high levels of oxidative damage become less conspicuous with increased sequestration of cardenolides, whereas those with low oxidative damage become more conspicuous with increased levels of cardenolides. There was no significant effect of oxidative damage or concentration of sequestered cardenolides on female conspicuousness. Our results demonstrate a physiological linkage between the production of coloration and protection from autotoxicity, and differential costs of signalling in monarch butterflies.
Publisher: PeerJ
Date: 04-11-2019
DOI: 10.7717/PEERJ.7998
Abstract: Video playback provides a promising method to study social interactions, and the number of video playback experiments has been growing in recent years. Using videos has advantages over live in iduals as it increases the repeatability of demonstrations, and enables researchers to manipulate the features of the presented stimulus. How observers respond to video playback might, however, differ among species, and the efficacy of video playback should be validated by investigating if in iduals’ responses to videos are comparable to their responses to live demonstrators. Here, we use a novel foraging task to compare blue tits’ ( Cyanistes caeruleus ) responses to social information from a live conspecific vs video playback. Birds first received social information about the location of food, and were then presented with a three-choice foraging task where they could search for food from locations marked with different symbols (cross, square, plain white). Two control groups saw only a foraging tray with similar symbols but no information about the location of food. We predicted that socially educated birds would prefer the same location where a demonstrator had foraged, but we found no evidence that birds copied a demonstrator’s choice, regardless of how social information was presented. Social information, however, had an influence on blue tits’ foraging choices, as socially educated birds seemed to form a stronger preference for a square symbol (against two other options, cross and plain white) than the control birds. Our results suggest that blue tits respond to video playback of a conspecific similarly as to a live bird, but how they use this social information in their foraging decisions, remains unclear.
Location: United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland
Location: United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland
Start Date: 03-2019
End Date: 12-2023
Amount: $300,000.00
Funder: Australian Research Council
View Funded ActivityStart Date: 07-2022
End Date: 07-2025
Amount: $403,431.00
Funder: Australian Research Council
View Funded Activity