BIBLIOS

Document type
Journal articles

Document subtype
Full paper

Title
Detrimental impact of a heatwave on male reproductive behaviour and fertility

Participants in the publication
Afonso Grandela (Author)
cE3c
Marta A. Antunes (Author)
cE3c
Marta A. Santos (Author)
Margarida Matos (Author)
cE3c/FCUL
Dep. Biologia Animal
Leonor R. Rodrigues (Author)
Dep. Biologia Animal
cE3c
Pedro Simões (Author)
Dep. Biologia Animal
cE3c

Summary
Understanding how heatwaves impact on different aspects of mating behaviour and fertility is getting increasingly important. In this context, laboratory fertility and mating experiments involving manipulation and exposure of insects to different thermal conditions are common procedures. To conduct such experiments practical methods such as dyes are needed for an easy, non-invasive discrimination of individuals. We report here a study measuring the effect of an extended heat stress applied to males on several parameters of mating behaviour and fertility of laboratory populations of Drosophila subobscura derived from two distinct European locations. We found highly detrimental effects of heatwave on mating behaviour—with longer (courtship and copulation) latencies and lower mating occurrence but no changes in mating duration—and fertility, with reduced fecundity and reproductive success. Furthermore, we also tested the efficacy of food dye as a marker for individual discrimination and mating occurrence. While food dye did not allow to infer the occurrence of a mating based on a transfer of coloration from male to female, it did not affect mating and fertility, attesting its utility has a method for discriminating individuals within mating experiments in the context of thermal studies. Importantly, despite the fact that the heatwave was only applied in males, we observed an impact on behaviour of females that mated with stressed males, by often refusing their nuptial feeding. This opens possibilities for further integrated research on the changes of female and male mating behaviour and fertility under different thermal scenarios.

Editor(s)
Springer


Institution
FACULDADE DE CIÊNCIAS DA UNIVERSIDADE DE LISBOA

Where published
acta ethologica

Publication Identifiers
ISSN - 0873-9749

Publisher
Springer Science and Business Media LLC



Document Identifiers
DOI - https://doi.org/10.1007/s10211-023-00431-7
URL - http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10211-023-00431-7

Rankings
SCIMAGO Q3 (2022) - 0.333 - Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics
Web Of Science Q3 (2022) - 1.1 - Zoology

Keywords
Climate change Heat stress · Mating behaviour Fertility Drosophila