Dataset Information

Warming waters beget smaller fish: evidence for reduced size and altered morphology in a desert fish following anthropogenic temperature change.

ABSTRACT: Poikilothermic organisms are predicted to show reduced body sizes as they experience warming environments under a changing global climate. Such a shrinking of size is expected under scenarios where rising temperatures increase cellular reaction rates and basal metabolic energy demands, therein requiring limited energy to be shifted from growth. Here, we provide evidence that the ecological changes associated with warming may not only lead to shrinking body size but also trigger shifts in morphology. We documented 33.4 and 39.0% declines in body mass and 7.2 and 7.6% reductions in length for males and females, respectively, in a wild population of Amargosa pupfish, Cyprinodon nevadensis amargosae, following an abrupt anthropogenically driven temperature increase. That reduction in size was accompanied by the partial or complete loss of paired pelvic fins in approximately 34% of the population, a morphological change concomitant with altered body dimensions including head size and body depth. These observations confirm that increasing temperatures can reduce body size under some ecological scenarios and highlight how human-induced environmental warming may also trigger morphological changes with potential relevance for fitness.

SUBMITTER: Lema SC

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6832196 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Warming waters beget smaller fish: evidence for reduced size and altered morphology in a desert fish following anthropogenic temperature change.

Lema Sean C SC Bock Samantha L SL Malley Morgan M MM Elkins Emma A EA

Biology letters 20191016 10

Poikilothermic organisms are predicted to show reduced body sizes as they experience warming environments under a changing global climate. Such a shrinking of size is expected under scenarios where rising temperatures increase cellular reaction rates and basal metabolic energy demands, therein requiring limited energy to be shifted from growth. Here, we provide evidence that the ecological changes associated with warming may not only lead to shrinking body size but also trigger shifts in morphol ...[more]

PMID: 31615375

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Project description:A challenge facing ecologists trying to predict responses to climate change is the few recent analogous conditions to use for comparison. For example, negative relationships between ectotherm body size and temperature are common both across natural thermal gradients and in small-scale experiments. However, it is unknown if short-term body size responses are representative of long-term responses. Moreover, to understand population responses to warming, we must recognize that individual responses to temperature may vary over ontogeny. To enable predictions of how climate warming may affect natural populations, we therefore ask how body size and growth may shift in response to increased temperature over life history, and whether short- and long-term growth responses differ. We addressed these questions using a unique setup with multidecadal artificial heating of an enclosed coastal bay in the Baltic Sea and an adjacent reference area (both with unexploited populations), using before-after control-impact paired time-series analyses. We assembled individual growth trajectories of ~13,000 unique individuals of Eurasian perch and found that body growth increased substantially after warming, but the extent depended on body size: Only among small-bodied perch did growth increase with temperature. Moreover, the strength of this response gradually increased over the 24 year warming period. Our study offers a unique example of how warming can affect fish populations over multiple generations, resulting in gradual changes in body growth, varying as organisms develop. Although increased juvenile growth rates are in line with predictions of the temperature-size rule, the fact that a larger body size at age was maintained over life history contrasts to that same rule. Because the artificially heated area is a contemporary system mimicking a warmer sea, our findings can aid predictions of fish responses to further warming, taking into account that growth responses may vary both over an individual's life history and over time.

Dataset Information

Warming waters beget smaller fish: evidence for reduced size and altered morphology in a desert fish following anthropogenic temperature change.

Publications

Warming waters beget smaller fish: evidence for reduced size and altered morphology in a desert fish following anthropogenic temperature change.

Similar Datasets

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