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Cue reliability, risk sensitivity and inducible morphological defense in a marine snail

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Abstract

Reliable cues that communicate current or future environmental conditions are a requirement for the evolution of adaptive phenotypic plasticity, yet we often do not know which cues are responsible for the induction of particular plastic phenotypes. I examined the single and combined effects of cues from damaged prey and predator cues on the induction of plastic shell defenses and somatic growth in the marine snail Nucella lamellosa. Snails were exposed to chemical risk cues from a factorial combination of damaged prey presented in isolation or consumed by predatory crabs (Cancer productus). Water-borne cues from damaged conspecific and heterospecific snails did not affect plastic shell defenses (shell mass, shell thickness and apertural teeth) or somatic growth in N. lamellosa. Cues released by feeding crabs, independent of prey cue, had significant effects on shell mass and somatic growth, but only crabs consuming conspecific snails induced the full suite of plastic shell defenses in N. lamellosa and induced the greatest response in all shell traits and somatic growth. Thus the relationship between risk cue and inducible morphological defense is dependent on which cues and which morphological traits are examined. Results indicate that cues from damaged conspecifics alone do not trigger a response, but, in combination with predator cues, act to signal predation risk and trigger inducible defenses in this species. This ability to “label” predators as dangerous may decrease predator avoidance costs and highlights the importance of the feeding habits of predators on the expression of inducible defenses.

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Acknowledgments

I would like to thank the director and staff of Friday Harbor Laboratories for logistical support. I am especially grateful to Megan Mach for help designing the experimental aquaria and assistance with daily maintenance of the experiment. Dianna Padilla, Geerat Vermeij, Jeff Levinton, Massimo Pigliucci, Geoff Trussell and three anonymous reviewers made constructive comments on earlier versions of the manuscript. Special thanks to Emily Thompson for her confident and judicious editing. A Ruth and Stephen Wainwright Fellowship funded this research. This is contribution number 1191 from the Department of Ecology and Evolution at Stony Brook University. The experiments comply with the current laws of the country in which they were performed.

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  1. Paul E. Bourdeau

    Present address: Department of Fisheries and Wildlife, Michigan State University, 13 Natural Resources, East Lansing, MI, 48824, USA

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  1. Department of Ecology and Evolution, Stony Brook University, Stony Brook, NY, 11794-5245, USA

    Paul E. Bourdeau

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  1. Paul E. Bourdeau
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Correspondence to Paul E. Bourdeau.

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Communicated by Geoffrey Trussell.

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Bourdeau, P.E. Cue reliability, risk sensitivity and inducible morphological defense in a marine snail. Oecologia 162, 987–994 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00442-009-1488-5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00442-009-1488-5

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