Costly plastic morphological responses to predator specific odour cues in three-spined sticklebacks (Gasterosteus aculeatus)

Abstract

Predation risk is one of the major forces affecting phenotypic variation among and within animal populations. While fixed anti-predator morphologies are favoured when predation level is consistently high, plastic morphological responses are advantageous when predation risk is changing temporarily, spatially, or qualitatively. Three-spined sticklebacks (Gasterosteus aculeatus) are well known for their substantial variability in morphology, including defensive traits. Part of this variation might be due to phenotypic plasticity. However, little is known about sticklebacks' plastic ability to react morphologically to changing risks of predation and about the proximate cues involved. Using a split-clutch design we show that odour of a predatory fish induces morphological changes in sticklebacks. Under predation risk, i.e., when exposed to odour of a predator, fish grew faster and developed a different morphology, compared to fish reared under low predation risk, i.e., exposed to odour of a non-predatory fish, or in a fish-free environment. However, fast growing comes at cost of increased body asymmetries suggesting developmental constraints. The results indicate that sticklebacks are able to distinguish between predatory and non-predatory fishes by olfactory cues alone. As fishes were fed on invertebrates, this reaction was not induced by chemical cues of digested conspecifics, but rather by predator cues themselves. Further, the results show that variation in body morphology in sticklebacks has not only a strong genetical component, but is also based on plastic responses to 123Evol Ecol (2011) 25:641-656 DOI 10.1007 different environments, in our case different predation pressures, thus opening new questions for this model species in ecology and evolution.

Paternal programming in sticklebacks

“…For example, predation pressure on sticklebacks (and other species; see Endler, 1995; Relyea, 2004; Vervust et al, 2007) is associated with smaller body size at sexual maturity (Bell, Dingemanse, Hankison, Langenhof, & Rollins, 2011), lower body condition (Frommen et al, 2011), reduced male nuptial coloration (Candolin, 1998) and reduced activity (Lacasse & Aubin-Horth, 2012). In this study, offspring of predator-exposed fathers had traits associated with predator-rich conditions: they were smaller, in poorer body condition, had reduced nuptial coloration (males) and were less active than offspring of unexposed fathers.…”

Resemblance to the Enemy’s Eyes Underlies the Intimidating Effect of Eyespots

“…During this treatment, half of the juvenile sticklebacks were exposed recurrently to predation threat in the form of visual and olfactory cues of live perch, chemical alarm cues from conspecifics, and visual cues of predation (perch feeding on pieces of sacrificed adult sticklebacks). Olfactory cues were included because threespine sticklebacks are known to respond to them (Frommen et al 2011). For the control, the other half of the juveniles were treated otherwise identically, except that they did not receive any visual predator cues and received water instead of the chemical cues.…”

Dynamic skeletogenesis in fishes: Insight of exercise training on developmental plasticity

“…Although thermally induced plasticity has been highly documented Moksness, 1994, 1997;Fuiman et al, 1998;Mabee et al, 2000;Georgakopoulou et al, 2007;Schmidt and Starck, 2010;Kawajiri et al, 2011), numerous environmental/experimental factors have also been investigated such as dissolved oxygen (Schmidt and Starck, 2010), salinity (Schmidt and Starck, 2010), diet (Meyer, 1987;Huysseune et al, 1994;Muschick et al, 2011), predator odors (Frommen et al, 2011), hormonal conditions (Shkil et al, 2010), habitat heterogeneity (Garduno-Paz et al, 2010), and water velocity (Pakkasmaa and Piironen, 2001;PeresNeto and Magnan, 2004;Grü nbaum et al, 2007Grü nbaum et al, , 2008Cloutier et al, 2010;Totland et al, 2011). Water velocity is of primary interest for at least two reasons.…”

“…A wide range of plastic responses has been reported in the literature. Focusing on anatomical plasticity, the following traits exemplify the types of responses: size [e.g., gills (Crispo and Chapman, 2010), brain (Crispo and Chapman, 2010), head (Meyer, 1987), body (Pakkasmaa and Piironen, 2001;Peres-Neto and Magnan, 2004;Georgakopoulou et al, 2007;Grü nbaum et al, 2008;Schmidt and Starck, 2010;Frommen et al, 2011;Kawajiri et al, 2011), fins (Fischer-Rousseau et al, 2009)] and shape changes [e.g., head (Meyer, 1987), pharyngeal (Muschnick et al, 2011) and oral jaws (Meyer, 1987), body (Pakkasmaa and Piironen, 2001;Peres-Neto and Magnan, 2004;Georgakopoulou et al, 2007;Grü nbaum et al, 2007;Fischer-Rousseau et al, 2009;Garduno-Paz et al, 2010;Frommen et al, 2011)], bone matrix (Totland et al, 2011), number of serially repeated elements [e.g., pharyngeal teeth, vertebrae, fin rays, spines (Arratia and Schultze, 1992;Mabee et al, 2000;Georgakopoulou et al, 2007;Shkil et al, 2010;Kawajiri et al, 2011)], and timing of ossification Moksness, 1994, 1997;Fuiman et al, 1998;Mabee et al, 2000;Cloutier et al, 2010, Fiaz et al, 2012. It is also known that fin positioning is plastic with respect to changes in hydrodynamic conditions …”