Meeting Abstract

69-3   11:00 - 11:15  An experimental test of the environmental matching hypothesis in an oviparous lizard Norris, MC*; Brown, OE; Warner, DA; Auburn University ; Auburn University ; Auburn University mcn0018@auburn.edu

Many organisms experience spatial and temporal heterogeneity in their environment. How organisms adjust to this heterogeneity can be challenging, especially for embryos of oviparous species the lack parental care because they cannot actively move to different environments if conditions change. Adaptive developmental plasticity is one route by which embryos can cope with environmental heterogeneity. The environmental matching hypothesis (EMH) predicts that organisms will develop phenotypes that are suited to their environment when the developmental environment matches the post-developmental environment. In this study, we test this prediction of the EMH using the brown anole lizard (Anolis sagrei). Importantly, our study site consists of several islands with a central area of dense tree canopy (shaded site) and peripheral area mostly composed of grasses (open site); eggs and hatchlings are commonly found in both these environments. We collected eggs (n=400) from a wild caught breeding colony from our study site and subjected them to incubation profiles that mimicked the shaded and open environments in temperature, substrate and moisture. After hatching, we measured offspring morphology and critical-thermal maximum (CTmax). All hatchlings were randomly assigned to a cage that simulated either shaded or open environments and were monitored for survival and growth. This design enabled us to evaluate the performance of offspring under matched and mismatched developmental and post-developmental environments. According to the EMH, we predict that offspring growth and survival will be relatively high when the egg-incubation environment matches that of the neonatal environment compared to when these environments are mismatched. This experimental test of the EMH will provide important insight into the adaptive significance of developmental plasticity under ecologically-meaningful conditions.