Tag Archives: Ecology

Predator-Driven Trait Diversification in a Dragonfly Genus: Covariation in Behavioral and Morphological Antipredator Defense

The impact of predation on phenotypic diversity is a topic that has only been studied recently. Prey use predator-specific correlated sets of morphological and behavioral traits to deter predators, and depending on the selection regime, these traits can be differently … Continue reading

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Breakdown of the brown trout evolutionary history due to hybridization between native and cultivated fish

As previously discussed, fishing tends to exploit certain size and age classes in populations, leaving managers with the problem of maintaining healthy populations. Last week we discussed how somatic growth rate and population levels of harvest will evolve in directions … Continue reading

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Life-History Evolution When Lestes Damselflies Invaded Vernal Ponds

While copious research has been conducted on the evolution of morphological characters, the macroevolution of life-history traits along environmental gradients is a relatively unknown field of study.  Life-History Theory posits that the timing and duration of important events in an … Continue reading

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Sustaining Fisheries Yields Over Evolutionary Time Scales

Fisheries want to exploit the largest fish, usually enforcing minimum size limits, which creates a truncated size and age distributing that lack larger and older fish. This form of management tends to ignore the potential for evolutionary change in harvestable … Continue reading

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Effects of zebra mussels (Dreissena polymorpha) on native bivalves: the beginning of the end or the end of the beginning?

Zebra mussels have coexisted in their native European range alongside sphaeriids and other unionids on a timescale ranging from decades to millennia. They were accidentally introduced to North American in the late 1980’s and have become well known for out … Continue reading

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Conspecific trailing behaviour of red-sided garter snakes, Thamnophis sirtalis parietalis, in the natural environment

In our recent discussion regarding the paper, “Conspecific trailing behaviour of red-sided garter snakes, Thamnophis sirtalis parietalis, in the natural environment,” we began a discussion based upon vertebrate chemical signals. The researchers in this article began their discussion of chemical … Continue reading

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The big question…

During our discussions last week, the same question kept coming back to me, and I thought it might be a good blog question to start a discussion on here, as it is somewhat of a charged question. (And I am … Continue reading

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“Extreme Color Variation within Populations of the Common Gartersnake, Thamnophis sirtalis, in Central North America, with Implications for Subspecies Status”

The researchers in the article, “Extreme Color Variation within Populations of the Common Gartersnake, Thamnophis sirtalis, in Central North America, with Implications for Subspecies Status,” describe the color frequency among the common garter snake in 9 different sampling sites. The … Continue reading

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