Biology Letters最新文献_第6页

Cat colonies reshape the abundance and body size of lizards. 猫群重塑了蜥蜴的数量和体型。

IF 2.7 2区生物学

Biology Letters Pub Date : 2026-07-01 DOI: 10.1098/rsbl.2026.0195

Airam Rodríguez, Juan Carlos Rando, Beneharo Rodríguez

{"title":"Cat colonies reshape the abundance and body size of lizards.","authors":"Airam Rodríguez, Juan Carlos Rando, Beneharo Rodríguez","doi":"10.1098/rsbl.2026.0195","DOIUrl":"10.1098/rsbl.2026.0195","url":null,"abstract":"The cat (Felis catus) is one of the worst invasive species, with well-documented impacts on biodiversity, especially on islands. Despite this, local administrations commonly implement trap-neuter-return (TNR) programmes to manage free-roaming cat populations. Here, we assess the effects of cat colonies on the endemic Tenerife lizard (Gallotia galloti). We used fruit-baited pitfall traps placed near and away from cat colonies to estimate lizard abundance and collect biometric data. Lizard abundance was lower near cat colonies compared with nearby control areas. Moreover, the individuals captured close to the colonies were smaller. Measurements of lizard carcasses found near colonies indicate that cats preferentially prey on larger individuals, explaining both their reduced abundance and their smaller body size. Interestingly, despite their smaller size, lizards near cat colonies presented higher scaled mass index values. Stable isotope analyses (δ13C and δ15N) of faecal samples suggest that these lizards partially rely on dried cat food available within colonies. Overall, cat colonies significantly altered lizard abundance, size structure and body condition. Given the ecological importance of G. galloti as both a seed disperser and prey, our findings highlight the need to limit the spread of free-roaming cat colonies, particularly in protected areas, to mitigate the effects on native biodiversity.","PeriodicalId":9005,"journal":{"name":"Biology Letters","volume":"22 7","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.7,"publicationDate":"2026-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148359372","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

引用次数: 0

Alpine adaptation drives rapid colour evolution in a Batesian mimic. 在贝叶斯模拟中，高山适应推动了颜色的快速进化。

IF 2.7 2区生物学

Biology Letters Pub Date : 2026-06-24 DOI: 10.1098/rsbl.2026.0052

Kahu Hema, Graham A McCulloch, Jonathan M Waters

引用次数: 0

An unrecognized fine-scale host-plant adaptation in a leaf miner: correct dorsoventral egg orientation is essential for successful leaf entry. 一个未被识别的细尺度寄主植物适应在叶矿工：正确的卵的背腹方向是必不可少的成功叶片进入。

IF 2.7 2区生物学

Biology Letters Pub Date : 2026-06-24 DOI: 10.1098/rsbl.2026.0164

Haruka Kondo, Issei Ohshima, Hajime Ono

{"title":"An unrecognized fine-scale host-plant adaptation in a leaf miner: correct dorsoventral egg orientation is essential for successful leaf entry.","authors":"Haruka Kondo, Issei Ohshima, Hajime Ono","doi":"10.1098/rsbl.2026.0164","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2026.0164","url":null,"abstract":"Larvae of leaf miners live within leaves and feed on internal tissues, making successful entry into the leaf essential for their endophagous lifestyle. In the leaf-mining moth Acrocercops transecta, females lay eggs on the surface of host-plant leaves. Immediately after hatching, larvae penetrate the leaf directly through the eggshell, representing the only opportunity to enter host leaves. Under laboratory conditions, we observed substantial mortality caused by failure of leaf entry. The nearly transparent eggshell of A. transecta enabled observation of embryonic development, revealing that correct dorsoventral orientation, ventral side facing the leaf epidermis, is essential for successful mining, whereas inverted orientation leads to failure. We developed a novel egg transplantation method and showed that correcting inverted embryos by flip transplantation restored mining success, while inverting normally oriented embryos prevented it. Notably, inverted embryos were also observed under natural conditions, causing mortality in first-instar larvae. Furthermore, under laboratory conditions, the mortality rates differed between the horticultural host Juglans regia and the natural host J. mandshurica. These results reveal a previously unrecognized source of mortality in leaf miners and demonstrate that precise dorsoventral orientation during oviposition is essential for offspring survival, highlighting a fine-scale egg-loading mechanism shaping successful host adaptation in insects.","PeriodicalId":9005,"journal":{"name":"Biology Letters","volume":"22 6","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.7,"publicationDate":"2026-06-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148307008","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

引用次数: 0

Song but not colour divergence constrains hybridization in birds. 鸟类的杂交受歌声而非颜色差异的限制。

IF 2.7 2区生物学

Biology Letters Pub Date : 2026-06-17 DOI: 10.1098/rsbl.2026.0237

Vicente García-Navas, Joaquín Ortego

{"title":"Song but not colour divergence constrains hybridization in birds.","authors":"Vicente García-Navas, Joaquín Ortego","doi":"10.1098/rsbl.2026.0237","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2026.0237","url":null,"abstract":"Mating signals, such as songs or plumage ornamentation, are key prezygotic barriers that promote behavioral isolation by ensuring that individuals are able to mate with conspecifics and avoid the costs of hybridization. Previous family-level comparative studies in birds have revealed that song similarity is positively correlated with the incidence of hybridization, whereas genomic research in avian hybrid zones suggests that plumage divergence does not necessarily prevent gene flow. However, no study has jointly evaluated the relative contribution of both signalling modalities to hybridization incidence within a broad macroevolutionary framework. We combined a large-scale dataset on documented hybridization events across bird species with quantitative measures of acoustic and plumage divergence and tested their association using phylogenetically informed comparative models. We found that species-level acoustic divergence showed a strong negative association with the number of hybridization partners after accounting for sympatry. In contrast, male plumage divergence did not predict hybridization incidence, yet female plumage divergence showed a significant negative association. These results indicate that song represents a major reproductive barrier in birds, probably because it is a long-range and evolutionarily labile signal. Moreover, male plumage coloration may play a more limited role in reproductive isolation, potentially because male ornaments may introgress more readily across species boundaries.","PeriodicalId":9005,"journal":{"name":"Biology Letters","volume":"22 6","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":2.7,"publicationDate":"2026-06-17","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148263142","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

引用次数: 0

Light exposure induces compensatory shelter tube construction in termites. 光照诱导白蚁的代偿性遮蔽管结构。

IF 3 2区生物学

Biology Letters Pub Date : 2026-06-10 DOI: 10.1098/rsbl.2026.0100

Payton Floyed, LeighAnn Slowick, Joseph McCarthy, Qian Sun

{"title":"Light exposure induces compensatory shelter tube construction in termites.","authors":"Payton Floyed, LeighAnn Slowick, Joseph McCarthy, Qian Sun","doi":"10.1098/rsbl.2026.0100","DOIUrl":"10.1098/rsbl.2026.0100","url":null,"abstract":"Many social insects build protective structures as first-line defences against environmental stressors and predators. This collective behaviour is regulated by various environmental cues through self-organized processes Although several factors such as humidity and tactile cues have been explored, it remains unclear whether light, a strong indicator of environmental exposure, can directly mediate collective construction. Termites are cryptic insects that constrain their activities within dark, enclosed environments, and many species build shelter tubes when exposed to open space, making them an ideal system to address this question. In this study, we examined shelter tube construction in the Formosan subterranean termite, Coptotermes formosanus, under light and dark conditions. We show that termite groups exposed to light increased construction activity, building shelter tubes faster and displacing more soil in open areas while consuming less food than those maintained in darkness. The results demonstrate that light acts as an aversive cue that accelerates protective construction, triggering termites to prioritize environmental buffering over food exploitation. Our findings reveal an empirical link between photosensory perception and collective construction, and highlight how sensory cues modulate task allocation and adaptive collective behaviour in social systems.","PeriodicalId":9005,"journal":{"name":"Biology Letters","volume":"22 6","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.0,"publicationDate":"2026-06-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148210104","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

引用次数: 0

Temporal consistency of judgement biases in bumblebees. 大黄蜂判断偏差的时间一致性。

IF 3 2区生物学

Biology Letters Pub Date : 2026-06-10 DOI: 10.1098/rsbl.2026.0011

Luigi Baciadonna, Vivek Nityananda

{"title":"Temporal consistency of judgement biases in bumblebees.","authors":"Luigi Baciadonna, Vivek Nityananda","doi":"10.1098/rsbl.2026.0011","DOIUrl":"10.1098/rsbl.2026.0011","url":null,"abstract":"Judgement bias tasks are increasingly used to assess affective states in animals, yet the extent to which they might reflect transient states or stable traits remains unclear. Here, we tested bumblebees (Bombus terrestris) in an active choice task across three repeated sessions to assess individual consistency in the absence of any manipulation. Bees were trained to associate each of two colours with either a high or a low reward, presented in separate chambers. During testing, they were presented with ambiguous colours. Bees were more likely to choose the high-reward chamber and to choose more quickly in response to colours closer to the positive colour. The latency to choose the cues showed significant and moderate repeatability across sessions, suggesting a stable, trait-like underlying component. In contrast, the repeatability of the chamber choices was negligible, indicating that such responses might be largely state-dependent and influenced by situational factors. These findings suggest that judgement biases, particularly as assessed through an active choice task, reflect states affected by external factors. Active choice tasks may help disentangle stable behavioural traits from transient affective states in invertebrates.","PeriodicalId":9005,"journal":{"name":"Biology Letters","volume":"22 6","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.0,"publicationDate":"2026-06-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148210124","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

引用次数: 0

Extinction risk and invasion success are associated with different functional traits in a tropical island flora. 热带岛屿植物群的灭绝风险和入侵成功与不同的功能性状有关。

IF 3 2区生物学

Biology Letters Pub Date : 2026-06-10 DOI: 10.1098/rsbl.2026.0015

Elise Adrien, Claudine Ah-Peng, Olivier Guy Flores, Rémi-Paul Grondin, Claire Fortunel, Isabelle Maréchaux, Dominique Strasberg, Robin Pouteau

{"title":"Extinction risk and invasion success are associated with different functional traits in a tropical island flora.","authors":"Elise Adrien, Claudine Ah-Peng, Olivier Guy Flores, Rémi-Paul Grondin, Claire Fortunel, Isabelle Maréchaux, Dominique Strasberg, Robin Pouteau","doi":"10.1098/rsbl.2026.0015","DOIUrl":"10.1098/rsbl.2026.0015","url":null,"abstract":"Islands host a disproportionately high richness of threatened native and invasive alien species. Despite intense research efforts, mechanisms underpinning extinction risk or invasion success are still not fully understood, which hinders the development of effective conservation strategies. The two-sides-of-the-same-coin (2sotsc) hypothesis, which states that traits involved in extinction risk and invasion success are identical, but with opposite values, remains largely untested at local scales where management occurs. Using five functional traits (specific leaf area, leaf dry matter content, maximum height, seed mass and dispersal syndrome) for 187 plant species from Reunion Island (Indian Ocean), we compared (i) threatened and non-threatened native woody species and (ii) invasive and non-invasive alien species. Seed mass was greater in threatened than in non-threatened woody natives. We found no trait difference among woody aliens, while specific leaf area was lower in invasive than in non-invasive aliens (woody and non-woody). Since different traits capture species differences in terms of extinction risk and invasion success, the underlying mechanisms are likely to differ. The species-centred perspective of the 2sotsc hypothesis appears too simplistic, which calls for better integrating community- and ecosystem-level impacts to resolve the complexity of extinction and invasion dynamics on islands and support informed conservation decision-making.","PeriodicalId":9005,"journal":{"name":"Biology Letters","volume":"22 6","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.0,"publicationDate":"2026-06-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148210085","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

引用次数: 0

Nest building as a missing piece in biparental care. 筑巢是双亲抚养中缺失的一部分。

IF 3 2区生物学

Biology Letters Pub Date : 2026-06-10 DOI: 10.1098/rsbl.2025.0767

Shoko Sugasawa, Emma Ramsay, Daniel Olivares Gallego, Susan D Healy

{"title":"Nest building as a missing piece in biparental care.","authors":"Shoko Sugasawa, Emma Ramsay, Daniel Olivares Gallego, Susan D Healy","doi":"10.1098/rsbl.2025.0767","DOIUrl":"10.1098/rsbl.2025.0767","url":null,"abstract":"Many birds practise biparental care, providing useful systems to study its evolution. Although nest building has largely been ignored as biparental behaviour, parental conflict and cooperation could begin during nest building, before incubation and offspring provisioning. While there are ample data on biparental incubation and provisioning in model species like zebra finches (Taeniopygia guttata), nest-building data largely concern material collection and preference in the males, not building by the females. Here, we collected data on building by both female and male zebra finches to test whether building behaviour depends on the behaviour of their mate or on the material they used to build their nest. Males held nest material more frequently when their female was in the nest, while females held nest material longer when their male was away from the nest. But neither females nor males altered their building behaviour in response to changes in their partner holding nest material. Males that built with stiff material held the material more frequently than those that built with flexible material, while females manipulated stiff and flexible materials similarly. The next step will be to determine whether these building interactions affect later stages of parental care in the wild or in other species.","PeriodicalId":9005,"journal":{"name":"Biology Letters","volume":"22 6","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.0,"publicationDate":"2026-06-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148210147","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

引用次数: 0

Differential pollinator importance contributes to flower colour variation along an elevational gradient. 不同传粉者的重要性有助于沿海拔梯度的花色变化。

IF 3 2区生物学

Biology Letters Pub Date : 2026-06-10 DOI: 10.1098/rsbl.2025.0826

Jonathan Heinze, Casper J van der Kooi, Johannes Spaethe

{"title":"Differential pollinator importance contributes to flower colour variation along an elevational gradient.","authors":"Jonathan Heinze, Casper J van der Kooi, Johannes Spaethe","doi":"10.1098/rsbl.2025.0826","DOIUrl":"10.1098/rsbl.2025.0826","url":null,"abstract":"Floral diversity is the hallmark of angiosperms, often shaped by pollinator-mediated selection when plants evolve traits that attract specific pollinator groups. Mediterranean red, bowl-shaped flowers are specialized for beetle pollination in areas with beetles (Glaphyridae) and bees but evolved different colours and specialize on bee pollinators where beetles are absent (e.g. at high elevations). What explains this apparent specialization? We assessed pollination effectiveness of honeybees and beetles for the colour-polymorphic Anemone pavonina in natural populations along the slope of Mount Olympus, Greece. We recorded duration and number of flower visits and quantified single-visit seed set. Per-visit effectiveness was almost fourfold higher for Pygopleurus beetles (36.3% of maximum seed set) than for honeybees (9.5%). Flower visits lasted markedly longer for beetles (56 seconds on average) than for honeybees (2 seconds). Beetle pollinator importance (single-visit seed set × visitation frequency) was highest at low elevations but declined with increasing elevation, whereas bee pollinator importance remained low yet constant across the elevational gradient. High beetle pollinator importance indicates that floral specialization for beetles is advantageous. Specializing for bee pollination is only beneficial at higher elevations, where bee pollinator importance exceeds that of beetles. This contributes to an elevational flower colour gradient.","PeriodicalId":9005,"journal":{"name":"Biology Letters","volume":"22 6","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.0,"publicationDate":"2026-06-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148210088","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

引用次数: 0

Thermal stress impairs survival and immune responses in ant founding queens. 热应激损害蚂蚁蚁后的生存和免疫反应。

IF 3 2区生物学

Biology Letters Pub Date : 2026-06-03 DOI: 10.1098/rsbl.2026.0072

Rafael C da Silva, Thibaud Monnin

引用次数: 0