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When being alive implies being safe: variation in mortality rates can cause oviposition selectivity to increase with age
Author(s) -
Tammaru Toomas,
Javoiš Juhan
Publication year - 2005
Publication title -
oikos
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.672
H-Index - 179
eISSN - 1600-0706
pISSN - 0030-1299
DOI - 10.1111/j.1600-0706.2005.14226.x
Subject(s) - context (archaeology) , variation (astronomy) , senescence , biology , life span , vital rates , selection (genetic algorithm) , demography , mortality rate , affect (linguistics) , residual , ageing , ecology , evolutionary biology , psychology , mathematics , computer science , population , population growth , paleontology , physics , genetics , communication , algorithm , artificial intelligence , sociology , astrophysics , microbiology and biotechnology
Optimal behavioural decisions are expected to depend on various state variables, such as physiological condition or age. In insects, empirical evidence of the effect of adult age on oviposition selectivity is mixed. Consistently, optimality models – which primarily incorporate the effects of egg load and senescence – fail to provide universal predictions. Here we propose that spatial variation in mortality rates creates an additional mechanism able to select for an increase in selectivity with age. Females can be selected to use the fact of having reached an advanced age as a cue of low mortality rates in their environment. Older females may thus be less time‐limited, and can afford for more careful host selection. This is because variation in mortality rates can cause a positive correlation between individual age, and expected residual life span. We present a simulation model that formalises the verbal argument presented above, and discuss the findings in the more general context of the dependence of reproductive output on age.