Habitat- and season-specific temperatures affect phenotypic development of hatchling lizards | Zendy

Phillip R. Pearson | Zendy; Daniel A. Warner | Zendy

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Habitat- and season-specific temperatures affect phenotypic development of hatchling lizards

Author(s) -

Phillip R. Pearson,

Daniel A. Warner

Publication year - 2016

Publication title -

biology letters

Language(s) - English

Resource type - Journals

SCImago Journal Rank - 1.596

H-Index - 110

eISSN - 1744-957X

pISSN - 1744-9561

DOI - 10.1098/rsbl.2016.0646

Subject(s) - biology , hatchling , lizard , anolis , nest (protein structural motif) , phenotypic plasticity , incubation , offspring , habitat , ecology , sauria , incubation period , zoology , maternal effect , wet season , phenotypic trait , phenotype , hatching , pregnancy , biochemistry , genetics , gene

Embryonic environments influence phenotypic development, but relatively few experiments have explored the effects of natural environmental variation. We incubated eggs of the lizardAnolis sagrei under conditions that mimicked natural spatial and temporal thermal variation to determine their effects on offspring morphology and performance. Incubation temperatures mimicked two microhabitats (open, shade) at two different times of the incubation season (April, July). Egg survival, incubation duration and offspring size were influenced by interactions between habitat- and season-specific nest temperatures, and locomotor performance was influenced primarily by temporal factors. These findings highlight the importance of spatial and temporal environmental variation in generating variation in fitness-related phenotypes.

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