Colonizing ability in the Echinochloa crus-galli complex (barnyard grass). I. Variation in life history

1981 ◽  
Vol 59 (10) ◽  
pp. 1844-1860 ◽  
Author(s):  
Spencer C. H. Barrett ◽  
Blake F. Wilson
Keyword(s):  
Life History ◽  
Seed Production ◽  
Life History Traits ◽  
Reproductive Effort ◽  
Nutrient Stress ◽  
Reproductive Phenology ◽  
Total Biomass ◽  
Barnyard Grass ◽  
Vegetative Biomass ◽  
Colonizing Ability

A comparison of life history traits in four taxa of the Echinochloa crus-galli complex (barnyard grass) which differ in colonizing ability and weediness was made under various environmental conditions. The taxa were the alien var. crus-galli, a cosmopolitan weed; var. oryzicola, a crop-mimic restricted to rice fields; var. frumentacea, a crop domesticate; and E. muricata, a native of wetland habitats. Populations studied were from the Central Valley of California where the four taxa are sympatric but ecologically differentiated. All comparisons were made under uniform glasshouse conditions to isolate the genetic component of life history variation. Measurements of the patterns of dry weight allocation, time to flowering, reproductive effort, and seed production were made on individuals grown during different periods of the year under "stress" and "nonstress" conditions utilizing randomized multi-harvest designs.Developmental plasticity in allocation patterns and reproductive phenology occurred in all taxa in response to seasonality and nutrient stress although there were significant differences among taxa in the form of the response. Individuals germinating in August yielded less total biomass and allocated a smaller proportion to roots and a larger proportion to secondary tillers and seed than individuals germinating in April. In all taxa, except E. crus-galli var. frumentacea, a delay in flowering under long days resulted in larger vegetative biomass, lower reproductive effort, and where nutrients were limiting, inhibition of secondary tillers. Nutrient stress resulted in a delay in flowering, increased senescence rates, and a reduction in total biomass and reproductive effort. Although each taxon displayed a wide range of tactics, certain differences in life history strategy among the taxa were maintained. In all regimes E. crus-galli var. crus-galli flowered earlier, and exhibited a greater seed production and reproductive effort than var. oryzicola. In general, E. crus-galli var. frumentacea and E. muricata were intermediate in behaviour.Interpopulation variability in the life history traits of E. crus-galli var. crus-galli and E. muricata was measured in a single-harvest, completely randomized design using 10 populations of each taxon. Significant interpopulation variation was recorded within taxa in tiller height and number, aboveground vegetative biomass, time to anthesis, reproductive biomass, harvest index, seed production, and seed weight. Averaged over 10 populations, E. crus-galli var. crus-galli was taller during vegetative growth, flowered more rapidly, allocated a greater proportion of aboveground biomass to reproduction, and produced a greater number of seeds than E. muricata.Variation in life history parameters among barnyard grass taxa may explain differences in colonizing potential. In particular, the failure of E. muricata and E. crus-galli var. oryzicola to colonize open, seasonally moist sites in California where E. crus-galli var. crus-galli flourishes, may be due to their inability to reach reproductive maturity before the onset of summer drought.

A Primer of Life Histories

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jeffrey A. Hutchings
Keyword(s):  
Life History ◽  
Life Histories ◽  
Life History Theory ◽  
Life History Traits ◽  
Reproductive Effort ◽  
Effective Means ◽  
Academic Experience ◽  
Sustainable Exploitation ◽  
Evolution Of Life ◽  
Opportune Time

Life histories describe how genotypes schedule their reproductive effort throughout life in response to factors that affect their survival and fecundity. Life histories are solutions that selection has produced to solve the problem of how to persist in a given environment. These solutions differ tremendously within and among species. Some organisms mature within months of attaining life, others within decades; some produce few, large offspring as opposed to numerous, small offspring; some reproduce many times throughout their lives while others die after reproducing just once. The exponential pace of life-history research provides an opportune time to engage and re-engage new generations of students and researchers on the fundamentals and applications of life-history theory. Chapters 1 through 4 describe the fundamentals of life-history theory. Chapters 5 through 8 focus on the evolution of life-history traits. Chapters 9 and 10 summarize how life-history theory and prediction has been applied within the contexts of conservation and sustainable exploitation. This primer offers an effective means of rendering the topic accessible to readers from a broad range of academic experience and research expertise.

Life histories of North American game birds: a reanalysis

1988 ◽  
Vol 66 (8) ◽  
pp. 1906-1912 ◽  
Author(s):  
Todd W. Arnold
Keyword(s):  
Life History ◽  
North American ◽  
Life Histories ◽  
Life History Traits ◽  
Reproductive Effort ◽  
Cost Of Reproduction ◽  
Reproductive Value ◽  
Trade Offs ◽  
Game Birds ◽  
The Cost

Recently, Zammuto (R. M. Zammuto. 1986. Can. J. Zool. 64: 2739–2749) suggested that North American game birds exhibited survival–fecundity trade-offs consistent with the "cost of reproduction" hypothesis. However, there were four serious problems with the data and the analyses that Zammuto used: (i) the species chosen for analysis ("game birds") showed little taxonomic or ecological uniformity, (ii) the measures of future reproductive value (maximum longevity) were severely biased by unequal sample sizes of band recoveries, (iii) the measures of current reproductive effort (clutch sizes) were inappropriate given that most of the birds analyzed produce self-feeding precocial offspring, and (iv) the statistical units used in the majority of analyses (species) were not statistically independent with respect to higher level taxonomy. After correcting these problems, I found little evidence of survival–fecundity trade-offs among precocial game birds, and I attribute most of the explainable variation in life-history traits of these birds to allometry, phylogeny, and geography.

Reproductive effort and phenology of seed production of savanna grasses with different growth form and life history

Vegetatio ◽  
1996 ◽  
Vol 123 (1) ◽  
pp. 91-100 ◽  
Author(s):  
E. M. Veenendaal ◽  
W. H. O. Ernst ◽  
G. S. Modise
Keyword(s):  
Life History ◽  
Seed Production ◽  
Reproductive Effort ◽  
Growth Form

Increased per-capita investment in egg production by female apple snails in the presence of predatory common carp

Behaviour ◽  
2003 ◽  
Vol 140 (7) ◽  
pp. 935-945 ◽  
Author(s):  
Katsuya Ichinose ◽  
Masahisa Tochihara
Keyword(s):  
Life History ◽  
Common Carp ◽  
Egg Production ◽  
Life History Traits ◽  
Rice Field ◽  
Reproductive Effort ◽  
Egg Mass ◽  
Mass Size ◽  
Per Capita ◽  
Egg Mass Size

AbstractWe hypothesized that apple snails would change life-history traits in the presence of common carp to reduce or avoid predation risk. Carp of about 150 mm body length were released in small plots set in a rice field in southern Japan at 0, 0.2, or 0.6 carp/m2. Egg-mass size, proportion of hatched eggs, and duration of hatching of the snail were measured once or twice a week from July to September. Snails collected in traps were used to estimate both snail density by the Jolly-Seber mark-recapture method and distribution of shell lengths in each plot. The weight of the snail was regressed on a size-weight equation, and the snail biomass was determined by multiplying the estimated density and the regressed weight. The reproductive effort of the snails was calculated as the number of eggs divided by the biomass of adult females. The egg mass size and reproductive effort were significantly increased in the presence of carp. These increases were considered as life-history changes of apple snails in the presence of a predator.

scholarly journals Dispersal as a source of variation in age-specific reproductive strategies in a wild population of lizards

2015 ◽  
Vol 282 (1820) ◽  
pp. 20151741 ◽  
Author(s):  
Olivier Cotto ◽  
Manuel Massot ◽  
Ophélie Ronce ◽  
Jean Clobert
Keyword(s):  
Life History ◽  
Body Condition ◽  
Life History Traits ◽  
Reproductive Effort ◽  
Wild Population ◽  
Recent Theory ◽  
Offspring Sex Ratio ◽  
Dispersal Syndromes ◽  
Common Lizard ◽  
High Investment

Dispersal syndromes describe the patterns of covariation of morphological, behavioural, and life-history traits associated with dispersal. Studying dispersal syndromes is critical to understanding the demographic and genetic consequences of movements. Among studies describing the association of life-history traits with dispersal, there is anecdotal evidence suggesting that dispersal syndromes can vary with age. Recent theory also suggests that dispersive and philopatric individuals might have different age-specific reproductive efforts. In a wild population of the common lizard ( Zootoca vivipara ), we investigated whether dispersive and philopatric individuals have different age-specific reproductive effort, survival, offspring body condition, and offspring sex ratio. Consistent with theoretical predictions, we found that young dispersive females have a higher reproductive effort than young philopatric females. Our results also suggest that the early high investment in reproduction of dispersive females trades-off with an earlier onset of senescence than in philopatric females. We further found that young dispersive females produce smaller offspring in lower body condition than do young philopatric females. Overall, our results provide empirical evidence that dispersive and philopatric individuals have different age-specific life-history traits.

Fishing-induced evolution and changing reproductive ecology of fish: the evolution of steepness

2010 ◽  
Vol 67 (10) ◽  
pp. 1708-1719 ◽  
Author(s):  
Katja Enberg ◽  
Christian Jørgensen ◽  
Marc Mangel
Keyword(s):  
Life History ◽  
Fisheries Management ◽  
Life Histories ◽  
Life History Traits ◽  
Management Practice ◽  
Total Biomass ◽  
Evolutionary Changes ◽  
Stock Biomass ◽  
Spawning Stock ◽  
Stock Recruitment

Fishing can induce evolutionary changes in individual life history traits, leading to fish that mature smaller and younger and with larger gonads, so that they reproduce more intensely. The steepness of a stock–recruitment relationship is commonly defined as the fraction of recruitment of an unfished population obtained when the spawning stock biomass is 20% of its unfished level. We use a model of harvest-induced evolutionary change to understand how the steepness of the stock–recruitment relationship changes due to fishing. If the true spawning stock biomass is known, the stock–recruitment relationship changes little under fishing-induced evolution and there is little concern for fisheries management. When management is based on a total biomass – recruitment relationship, recruitment may be underestimated, which is also of little concern from a sustainability perspective. However, when the number of spawners – recruitment relationship is used to forecast recruitment, management practice that ignores the evolution of steepness may overestimate recruitment and therefore recommend catches that exceed safe biological limits. Using outdated maturity ogives underestimates spawning stock biomass, which results in steeper and higher stock–recruitment relationships as life histories evolve. Although of little concern for sustainability, this may pose challenges for practical fisheries management.

Life-history variation in the annual arable weed Diplotaxis erucoides (Cruciferae)

1994 ◽  
Vol 72 (1) ◽  
pp. 10-19 ◽  
Author(s):  
F. X. Sans ◽  
R. M. Masalles
Keyword(s):  
Life History ◽  
Biomass Allocation ◽  
Plant Architecture ◽  
Reproductive Effort ◽  
Plant Size ◽  
Early Spring ◽  
Life History Variation ◽  
Arable Weed ◽  
Vegetative Biomass ◽  
Diplotaxis Erucoides

Variation in life-history traits such as emergence, survival, time of flowering, and fecundity were studied in Diplotaxis erucoides, a mediterranean winter annual weed, by analyzing cohorts that emerged in autumn, early spring, and spring. The response of the plants to the environment, as reflected by plant architecture and pattern of biomass allocation, was also studied. Seedlings that germinate in autumn produced from 3 to 10 times more seeds than those that germinated in spring. The main factor affecting the number of seeds produced appears to be the life-span. Reduction of the growing period led to a decrease in both number and length of modular units, which resulted in decreased numbers of leaves, flowers, and fruits of each module. In semelparous D. erucoides plants, differences in the pattern of biomass allocation to reproduction are related to plant size. Our field data indicate that an increase of reproductive effort with size occurs in small individuals; however, a decrease occurs for vegetative biomass greater than 2 g and less than 5 g. Little variation in reproductive effort occurs when vegetative biomass is greater than 5 g. From a strategic point of view, size-dependent variation of reproductive effort in D. erucoides can be interpreted as good tactics to favour a higher proportion of resources devoted to reproduction in small individuals, thus ensuring some offspring. However, structural, developmental, and physiological constraints lead to stabilization or even a decrease in reproductive effort above a certain threshold size, when production of offspring is already ensured. Key words: phenotypic plasticity, plant architecture, biomass allocation, Diplotaxis erucoides.

scholarly journals Macroevolution of dimensionless life history metrics in tetrapods

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cecina Babich Morrow ◽  
S. K. Morgan Ernest ◽  
Andrew J. Kerkhoff
Keyword(s):  
Life History ◽  
Body Mass ◽  
Life History Traits ◽  
Reproductive Effort ◽  
Life History Strategies ◽  
Offspring Size ◽  
Evolutionary Transitions ◽  
Trade Offs ◽  
Survival And Reproduction ◽  
The Impact

AbstractLife history traits represent organism’s strategies to navigate the fitness trade-offs between survival and reproduction. Eric Charnov developed three dimensionless metrics to quantify fundamental life history trade-offs. Lifetime reproductive effort (LRE), relative reproductive lifespan (RRL), and relative offspring size (ROS), together with body mass, can be used classify life history strategies across the four major classes of tetrapods: amphibians, reptiles, mammals, and birds. First, we investigate how the metrics have evolved in concert with body mass. In most cases, we find evidence for correlated evolution between body mass and the three metrics. Finally, we compare life history strategies across the four classes of tetrapods and find that LRE, RRL, and ROS delineate a space in which the major tetrapod clades occupy mostly unique subspaces. These distinct combinations of life history strategies provide us with a framework to understand the impact of major evolutionary transitions in energetics, physiology, and ecology.

The trade-off of reproduction and survival in slow-breeding seabirds

2010 ◽  
Vol 88 (9) ◽  
pp. 889-899 ◽  
Author(s):  
F. Stephen Dobson ◽  
Pierre Jouventin
Keyword(s):  
Life History ◽  
Body Size ◽  
Life History Traits ◽  
Feeding Rate ◽  
Reproductive Effort ◽  
Original Data ◽  
Age At Maturity ◽  
Trade Off ◽  
Trade Offs ◽  
Regression Techniques

A trade-off between reproduction and survival is one of the most consistent empirical aspects of life-history diversification. One explanation for this interspecific pattern is evolved differences in the balance of allocation to reproduction versus individual maintenance and survival. The same pattern is expected, however, simply as a result of differences among species in body size. We tested these alternatives using original data from 44 species of albatrosses and petrels, long-lived seabirds that breed very slowly. After application of regression techniques to remove the effects of body size and phylogeny, annual reproduction and survival exhibited a significant trade-off. Our measures of reproductive effort also exhibited significant trade-offs with age at maturity, the latter strongly associated with survival. Feeding rate of chicks, success at fledging chicks, and annual chick production were also significantly associated. In conclusion, after removing the effects of body size, we found a significant trade-off of reproduction and survival, in spite of the fact that these long-lived birds lay only one egg at a time. Our examination of the pattern among life-history traits of these slow breeders and their pelagic feeding ecology provide support for the evolutionary explanation of a trade-off of reproduction and survival.

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