Adaptive significance of death feigning posture as a specialized inducible defence against gape-limited predators

Honma, Atsushi; Oku, Shintaro; Nishida, Takayoshi

doi:10.1098/rspb.2006.3501

Cited by 97 publications

(91 citation statements)

References 17 publications

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“…In this case, tonic immobility plays a role in concealment and/or background matching. (iii) The 'physical defence' hypothesis: a tonically immobile grasshopper can adopt a characteristic posture that enlarges its functional body size by stretching each of its body parts, thereby making it difficult for frogs to swallow the grasshopper; thus, in this case tonic immobility constitutes a physical defence (Honma et al 2006). (iv) The 'loss of predator's interest' hypothesis: immobility is adaptive for defence against hunters who respond to moving prey (Miyatake et al 2004).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Tonically immobilized selfish prey can survive by sacrificing others

et al. 2009

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Death-feigning, also called tonic immobility, is found in a number of animal species across vertebrate and invertebrate taxa. To date, five hypotheses have been proposed for the adaptive significance of tonic immobility. These are that tonic immobility is effective for prey because (i) avoiding dead prey is safer for predators, (ii) immobility plays a role in physical defence, (iii) immobility plays a role in concealment and/or background matching, (iv) predators lose interest in unmoving prey, and (v) the characteristic immobilization posture signals a bad taste to predators. The fourth and fifth hypotheses have been considered suitable explanations for tonic immobility of the red flour beetle against its predator, the jumping spider. In the present study, we used chemical analyses of secretions by the red flour beetles under attack by the jumping spider to reject the fifth hypothesis for this system. More importantly, we tested a selfish-prey hypothesis for the adaptive significance of death-feigning as an anti-predator strategy, in which individuals adopting tonic immobility survive by sacrificing neighbours. Findings showed that survival rates of feigners were higher when in the presence of non-feigners or prey of a different species, compared to when alone, thus confirming our selfish-prey hypothesis. In summary, our results suggest that immobility following a spider attack is selfish; death-feigning prey increase their probability of survival at the expense of more mobile neighbours.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Tonically immobilized selfish prey can survive by sacrificing others

et al. 2009

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“…In addition to escape responses, other response types which do not imply much displacement of the body, such as freezing, changes in opercular frequency, erection of spines and fins, and the adoption of body postures, have been observed in threatened fish (Godin, 1997;Huntingford et al, 1994;Ylonen et al, 2007). The adoption of specific postures in prey animals as a response to potential threats has been interpreted in various ways, including vigilance (Lima and Dill, 1990;Wisenden et al, 1995), aggressive/defensive display (Huntingford et al, 1994;Sherbrooke, 2008;Stankowich, 2009), pursuit deterrence (Caro, 1995;Cooper, 2007;Smith, 1997), facilitation of crypsis (Bealor and Krekorian, 2002), size advertising (Honma et al, 2006;Sherbrooke, 2008) and death feigning (Gerald, 2008;Gyssels and Stoks, 2005;Honma et al, 2006). The possibility that an alternative (or additional) function of certain anti-predator postures might be that of enhancing performance in a subsequent escape has been largely unexplored.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Preparing for escape: anti-predator posture and fast-start performance in gobies

Turesson

Satta

Domenici

2009

Journal of Experimental Biology

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SUMMARYThe adoption of postures as a response to threats is often interpreted in terms of predator detection or signalling (e.g. vigilance and defence display). The possibility that an alternative or additional function of anti-predator postures might be to enhance the subsequent escape has been largely unexplored. Here, we use black goby (Gobius niger) to test the hypothesis that a postural curvature caused by a bending response (i.e. a slow muscle contraction which bends the body with no forward displacement) induced by a weak stimulus (WS) may affect escape responses. Three experiments were carried out. (1) Control and WSstimulated fish were startled using lateral mechanical stimuli, to test whether the orientation of the postural C-bend affected escape direction and performance. Postural curvature was defined as positive when escapes were towards the convex side of the postural C-shape, and negative when they were towards the concave side. Locomotor performance increased with postural curvature, although fish showed a preference for escaping away from the stimulus regardless of postural curvature. (2) Control and WS-stimulated fish were startled from above, hence minimising the directionality of the threat on the horizontal plane. WSstimulated fish showed a bias towards escaping from a positive curvature, thereby enhancing their locomotor performance. (3) Field observations with stimuli coming from above showed that gobies escape most often towards the convex side of the postural C-shape. By escaping from positively curved postures, most of the initial tailsweep is directed backwards and may provide more thrust than when starting from straight or negatively curved postures. Hence, the anti-predator posture adopted by alerted benthic fishes may 'prepare' them for their subsequent escape response because it conveys an advantage when they are attacked from above (a likely occurrence), although when gobies are stimulated horizontally, escape direction may be favoured over high locomotor performance when the two trade off.

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“…Recently, the number of studies focusing on the variously adaptive significance of this behaviour in defence has increased (Miyatake et al 2004;Honma et al 2006;Ruxton 2006;Cassill et al 2008;Hansen et al 2008).…”

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confidence: 99%

Genetic trade-off between abilities to avoid attack and to mate: a cost of tonic immobility

Nakayama

Miyatake

2009

Biol. Lett.

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Consistent individual differences in correlated behaviours across contexts or situations, that is, behavioural syndromes, have recently been identified as an important factor shaping the evolution of behavioural traits, because of their potential for explaining trade-offs in behavioural responses. We examined a genetic link between abilities to mate and to avoid predation from the viewpoint of two genetically correlated behavioural traits; tonic immobility (TI), which is considered to be an antipredator behaviour, and activity levels in the red flour beetle, Tribolium castaneum. Males derived from two strains artificially selected for divergent durations of TI were used in the present study: the L strain (with longer duration and higher frequency of TI) and the S strain (shorter duration and lower frequency of TI). We found that males of the L strain had higher survival rates in predatory environments than those of the S strain, and lower mating success even in predator-free environments. To our knowledge, this is the first empirical study showing a genetic trade-off between abilities to mate and to avoid predation in relation to behavioural syndromes, using individuals exhibiting different behavioural strategies.

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Adaptive significance of death feigning posture as a specialized inducible defence against gape-limited predators

Cited by 97 publications

References 17 publications

Tonically immobilized selfish prey can survive by sacrificing others

Tonically immobilized selfish prey can survive by sacrificing others

Preparing for escape: anti-predator posture and fast-start performance in gobies

Genetic trade-off between abilities to avoid attack and to mate: a cost of tonic immobility

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