Paternal care in a fish: epigenetics and fitness enhancing effects on offspring anxiety

McGhee, Katie E.; Bell, Alison M.

doi:10.1098/rspb.2014.1146

Cited by 69 publications

(57 citation statements)

References 34 publications

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“…Thus, previous predator experiences of mothers can influence offspring traits and survival both directly [12,13,21] and indirectly through how these experiences affect paternal care (this study). Paternal care in this species affects offspring behavioural [26,28,29] and morphological [26] development, brain gene expression [28] and is linked to offspring survival with predators [28]. Whether paternal care can compensate for the negative effects of maternal predator exposure on offspring, or complements these maternal effects, remains unknown.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A female's past experience with predators affects male courtship and the care her offspring will receive from their father

et al. 2015

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Differential allocation occurs when individuals adjust their reproductive investment based on their partner's traits. However, it remains unknown whether animals differentially allocate based on their partner's past experiences with predation risk. If animals can detect a potential mate's experience with predators, this might inform them about the stress level of their potential mate, the likelihood of parental effects in offspring and/or the dangers present in the environment. Using threespined stickleback (Gasterosteus aculeatus), we examined whether a female's previous experience with being chased by a model predator while yolking eggs affects male mating effort and offspring care. Males displayed fewer conspicuous courtship behaviours towards females that had experienced predation risk in the past compared with unexposed females. This differential allocation extended to how males cared for the resulting offspring of these matings: fathers provided less parental care to offspring of females that had experienced predation risk in the past. Our results show for the first time, to our knowledge, that variation among females in their predator encounters can contribute to behavioural variation among males in courtship and parental care, even when males themselves do not encounter a predator. These results, together with previous findings, suggest that maternal predator exposure can influence offspring development both directly and indirectly, through how it affects father care.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A female's past experience with predators affects male courtship and the care her offspring will receive from their father

et al. 2015

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“…The fish hatchery environment and management practices used to raise fish can produce stable, heritable, nongenetic changes in fish (Salinas and Munch ; Evans et al. ; McGhee and Bell ; Shao et al. ; Jonsson and Jonsson ).…”

Section: Why Production Management Is Counterproductivementioning

confidence: 99%

Is Good Fish Culture Management Harming Recovery Efforts in Aquaculture‐Assisted Fisheries?

Tave¹,

Hutson²

2019

N American J Aquac

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To make conservation aquaculture successful, a paradigm shift is needed in what is considered good hatchery management as defined by production aquaculture as well as in the metrics that are used to evaluate hatchery success. In production aquaculture, managers strive to maintain exceptional environmental conditions to maximize yield, the number of fish produced, and survival. However, this type of aquaculture management could decrease the likelihood of success of imperiled species recovery programs due to domestication and epigenetics. Consequently, good management practices in conservation aquaculture should produce conditions that resemble the environment where the fish will be stocked in order to minimize domestication and epigenetic problems that will lower the fitness of wild stocks following augmentation. Changes in what are considered good culture conditions require a new set of hatchery evaluation metrics. The key metric that needs to be altered is the survival rate. Survival is the keystone metric because it determines other metrics such as the number produced, yield, and profits. High survival rates influence domestication, which adversely affects post‐augmentation survival and the fitness of the wild stock. Consequently, lower hatchery survival rates produced by selective pressures in conservation aquaculture are needed to improve success in imperiled species recovery programs. We propose that survival be 10–25% to improve success. Our proposed evaluation metrics for conservation aquaculture are to produce “wild” fish and not lower the fitness of the wild population. We recognize that these recommendations are controversial, but a major goal of this paper is to start a discussion about the most appropriate way to evaluate this type of aquaculture so that recovery efforts for imperiled species can be improved.

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“…While recent studies are documenting the important consequences of paternal stress prior to conception on offspring brain development [31] and HPA axis regulation [32,33] potentially via changes in DNA methylation in sperm [34], these are some of the first data to show that fathers, like mothers, can influence their offspring post-fertilization. Furthermore, we have found that father care alters expression of a gene responsible for de novo methylation (DNMT3a) in offspring brains [35], suggesting that paternal care might have long-lasting effects on offspring behavior via DNA methylation.…”

Section: Effects Of Paternal Stress On Offspring Outcomes In Sticklebmentioning

confidence: 99%

Effects of mothers’ and fathers’ experience with predation risk on the behavioral development of their offspring in threespined sticklebacks

Bell

McGhee

Stein

2016

Current Opinion in Behavioral Sciences

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Stressors experienced by parents can influence the behavioral development of their offspring. Here, we review recent studies in threespined sticklebacks (a species in which males are the sole providers of parental care) showing that when parents are exposed to an ecologically relevant stressor (predation risk), there are consequences for offspring. For example, female sticklebacks exposed to predation risk produce eggs with higher concentrations of cortisol, a stress hormone, and offspring with altered behavior and physiology. Male sticklebacks exposed to predation risk produce offspring that are less active, smaller, and in poorer condition. The precise mechanisms by which maternal and paternal experiences with predators affect offspring phenotypes are under investigation, and could include steroid hormones, olfactory cues and/or parental behavior. As in other species, some of the consequences of parental exposure to predation risk for offspring in sticklebacks might be adaptive, but depend on the stressor, the reliability of the parental and offspring environments and the evolutionary history of the population.

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Paternal care in a fish: epigenetics and fitness enhancing effects on offspring anxiety

Cited by 69 publications

References 34 publications

A female's past experience with predators affects male courtship and the care her offspring will receive from their father

A female's past experience with predators affects male courtship and the care her offspring will receive from their father

Is Good Fish Culture Management Harming Recovery Efforts in Aquaculture‐Assisted Fisheries?

Effects of mothers’ and fathers’ experience with predation risk on the behavioral development of their offspring in threespined sticklebacks

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