Phenotypic variation in an oviparous montane lizard: effects of thermal and hydric incubation environments

Détails

ID Serval
serval:BIB_043662FF3BCB
Type
Article: article d'un périodique ou d'un magazine.
Collection
Publications
Titre
Phenotypic variation in an oviparous montane lizard: effects of thermal and hydric incubation environments
Périodique
Biological Journal of the Linnean Society
Auteur⸱e⸱s
Flatt T., Shine R., Borges-Landaez P.A., Downes S.J.
ISSN
0024-4066
Statut éditorial
Publié
Date de publication
2001
Peer-reviewed
Oui
Volume
74
Numéro
3
Pages
339-350
Langue
anglais
Résumé
Recent studies have shown that incubation temperatures can profoundly affect the phenotypes of hatchling lizards, but the effects of hydric incubation environments remain controversial. We examined incubation-induced phenotypic variation in Bassiana duperreyi (Gray, 1938; Sauria: Scincidae), an oviparous montane lizard from south-eastern Australia. We incubated eggs from this species in four laboratory treatments, mimicking cool and moist, cool and dry, warm and moist, and warm and dry natural nest-sites, and assessed several morphological and behavioural traits of lizards after hatching. Incubation temperature influenced a lizard's hatching success, incubation period, tail length and antipredator behaviour, whereas variation in hydric conditions did not engender significant phenotypic variation for most traits. However, moisture affected incubation period slightly differently in males and females, and for a given snout-vent length moisture interacted weakly with temperature to affect lizard body mass. Although incubation conditions can substantially affect phenotypic variation among hatchling lizards, the absence of strong hydric effects suggests that hatchling lizards react less plastically to variation in moisture levels than they do to thermal conditions. Thus, our data do not support the generalization that water availability during embryogenesis is more important than temperature in determining the phenotypes of hatchling reptiles.
Mots-clé
reptiles, hatchling, phenotypic plasticity, reaction norm, temperature, water potential, sexual dimorphism, life history, phenotype
Web of science
Création de la notice
28/01/2013 13:50
Dernière modification de la notice
20/08/2019 12:26
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