Parasitism Reduces the Potential for Evolution in a Wild Bird Population

Charmantier, Anne; Kruuk, Loeske E. B.; Lambrechts, Marcel M.

doi:10.1554/03-350

Cited by 14 publications

(22 citation statements)

References 38 publications

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“…Differences in the expression of maternal effects between individuals may be increased or decreased by environmental stress. For instance, in the blue tit Parus caeruleus, the variance in offspring growth rates arising from shared environment effects between nests (which will be heavily determined by parental effects) increased with environmental stress arising from parasitism by blowfly larvae (Charmantier, Kruuk & Lambrechts 2004). In contrast, the maternal genetic component of variance in lamb birth weight in Soay sheep was reduced in poor environments ).…”

Section:       mentioning

confidence: 99%

Maternal effects and evolution at ecological time‐scales

2007

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Summary1. Genetic and environmental maternal effects can play an important role in the evolutionary dynamics of a population: they may have a substantial impact on the rate and direction of genetic change in response to selection, and they may generate immediate phenotypic change via phenotypic plasticity. Because of this potential to generate rapid phenotypic change in a population, maternal effects may be particularly important for evolution at ecological time-scales. 2. Despite an increased interest in the prevalence, composition and adaptive benefits of maternal effects, little is still known of their impact on ecological and evolutionary processes in natural populations. We consider here the insights that a quantitative genetic framework provides into the pathways by which maternal effects can influence trait evolution in wild populations. Widespread evidence for a genetic basis of a range of maternal effects traits reinforces the notion that they cannot be treated as purely environmental sources of variation. We also provide an overview of the impact of environmental conditions on the expression and impact of maternal effects, and describe empirical evidence for their impact on evolution at ecological time-scales. 3. We emphasize the need for empirical work to quantify the associations between maternal and offspring phenotype and genotype, and the suite of selection pressures generated by maternal effects, as well as the relationship between maternal effects and environmental variation. Future work should aim to identify the conditions under which maternal effects are likely to play a role in evolution, as well as explicitly test the contribution of maternal effects to evolutionary responses.

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Section:       mentioning

confidence: 99%

Maternal effects and evolution at ecological time‐scales

2007

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“…We used the pedigrees of social relationships from the long-term monitoring of Muro (1994Muro ( -2007 and Pirio , along with the phenotypic records on egg laying dates during the same period in these two study sites, to decompose the breeding date of a pair into male and female phenotypic and genetic components. A quantitative genetic framework has been used before in these populations to estimate heritabilities of morphological traits (Charmantier et al . 2004a;Charmantier et al .…”

Section: Q U a N T I T A T I V E G E N E T I C A N A L Y S I Smentioning

confidence: 99%

“…However, it could also be related to heritability decreasing in constraining as compared to favourable conditions as observed in different taxa in the wild (see reviews in Hoffmann & Merila 1999;Charmantier & Garant 2005). In the Mediterranean region, different studies have suggested higher constraints in evergreen compared to deciduous habitats, notably in terms of food availability and parasitic loads (Zandt et al 1990;Blondel et al 1993;Hurtrez-Boussès et al 1998;Tremblay et al 2003), that can for example significantly reduce the heritability of chick tarsus length (Charmantier et al 2004a). Finally, the levels of extra-pair paternity (EPP) are very high in Pirio (25% of EPP in 68% of broods), while comparatively lower in Muro (18% of EPP in 50% of broods, Charmantier et al 2004c).…”

Section: F E M a L E D R I V E A D A P T I V E B R E E D I N G D I F mentioning

confidence: 99%

Local adaptation of timing of reproduction: females are in the driver's seat

et al. 2009

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Summary 1.Breeding at the right time of the year is crucial for many temperate zone organisms, as any mismatch with their optimal breeding period leads to a reduction in fitness. The roles of the breeding partners in these adaptive decisions have, however, only rarely been studied. 2. In blue tits ( Cyanistes caeruleus ) that breed in heterogenous Mediterranean habitats, nearby populations show up to 1-month differences in breeding time. This difference is adaptive as the optimal time for breeding varies by the same amount due to habitat characteristics. But which sex is determining this large difference in timing? 3. We show here that the seasonal development of female reproductive activity (yolk precursor production) closely matches the local optimal breeding time in these two highly contrasted landscapes, while previous studies have demonstrated that male gonadal development does not. In accordance with this, quantitative genetic analyses reveal that timing for breeding is determined by the female only, with no evidence for an additive genetic male effect on laying date. 4. Our results strongly suggest that the adaptive inter-population difference in the laying periods has been driven by females. The central role of females in the determination of breeding period needs to be included when studying how micro-evolutionary processes are affected by global climate change.

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“…2). Early environmental effects reducing the expression of genetic variance (Merilä , 1997;Qvarnströ m, 1999;Merilä et al, 2001;Charmantier et al, 2004;Garant et al, 2004) or maternal effects through the egg in relation to paternal age and attractiveness (Gil et al, 1999;Strasser & Schwabl, 2004) are unlikely to have caused the heritability changes, as the trait showed no effect of either early development or adult condition (Hegyi et al, 2002;this study). This raises the possibility of a microevolutionary change in the expression of genetic variance during the study period, with males increasingly growing small badges as yearlings, and resembling their fathers only later in life.…”

Section: Change In Signal Information Contentmentioning

confidence: 99%

Rapid temporal change in the expression and age-related information content of a sexually selected trait

Hegyi

Török

Tóth

et al. 2006

Journal of Evolutionary Biology

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The expression of sexual signals is often phenotypically plastic and also evolves rapidly. Few studies have considered the possibility that proximate determination – the pathway between genes and trait expression – may also be subject to both phenotypic plasticity and evolutionary change. We examined long‐term patterns in size, condition‐ and age‐dependence, repeatability and heritability of forehead patch size, a sexually selected plumage trait in male collared flycatchers. We also estimated survival and sexual selection on the phenotypic value of the trait. Forehead patch size linearly declined during the 15 years, probably due to the significantly negative survival selection. In addition, the expression of genetic variation for the ornament apparently underwent an age‐limited change, which implies a change in the information content of the signal to receivers. The persistent lack of condition‐dependence makes phenotypic plasticity an unlikely explanation to our results. This raises the possibility of a microevolutionary change of both expression and proximate determination during the study period.

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Parasitism Reduces the Potential for Evolution in a Wild Bird Population

Cited by 14 publications

References 38 publications

Maternal effects and evolution at ecological time‐scales

Maternal effects and evolution at ecological time‐scales

Local adaptation of timing of reproduction: females are in the driver's seat

Rapid temporal change in the expression and age-related information content of a sexually selected trait

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