“…Thus, the lamellar joint may mediate a trade-off under dragonfly predation between structural support for larger lamellae that enhances evasive swimming and structural support for smaller lamellae that enhances lamellar autotomy (Bose and Robinson, 2013). Losing lamellae can have additional costs related to survival, such as decreased swimming performance (Robinson et al, 1991a;Burnside and Robinson, 1995;McPeek et al, 1996;Stoks, 1999b;Gyssels and Stoks, 2005), which can impair future escape attempts (Gyssels and Stoks, 2005); reduced attempts at escape under predation threat (Robinson et al, 1991a;Gyssels and Stoks, 2005); greater risk of being cannibalised by conspecifics (Stoks, 1998); and reduced oxygen consumption (Eriksen, 1986;Robinson et al, 1991b), foraging (Stoks, 1999a) and growth (Stoks, 2001). These costs may be lessened by regenerating missing lamellae in as little as two moults (Robinson et al, 1991b), but they also strongly suggest substantial survival benefits of lamellar autotomy.…”