Líffræðifélag Íslands - biologia.is
Líffræðiráðstefnan 2021
Erindi/veggspjald / Talk/poster E102
Höfundar / Authors: Michelle Valliant (1), Anja Nickel (1), Guðbjörg Ásta Ólafsdóttir (1)
Starfsvettvangur / Affiliations: 1. Háskóli Íslands, Rannsóknasetur á Vestfjörðum
Kynnir / Presenter: Guðbjörg Ásta Ólafsdóttir
Behavior allows individuals to respond to changes as they occur, thereby facilitating the survival of populations or species faced with vacillating conditions, even without adaptation. Behavioral plasticity, that is, the behavioral scope of an individual across (environmental) contexts, should therefore be advantageous to the organism. Despite this, behavioral plasticity is known to vary both between and within species and often the individual has a narrow range of behavioral expression compared to a larger group of conspecifics. As global change continues many expect “winners” and “losers” as species will respond differently to the rapid environmental change. A pressing concern is to understand the scope of closely related and/or sympatric species to respond to such change, for example, in physiology and behavior. In the current research we present early results of behavioral variation and behavioral plasticity of two closely related gadoid species, Atlantic cod (Gadus morhua), including two migratory ecotypes, and saithe (Pollachius virens) across ontogeny. Both laboratory and field measures of behavior were conducted examining activity, boldness and variation in these traits across social contexts. These species coexist on near-shore nursery grounds exhibiting high tropic niche overlap but, perhaps, niche divergence by behavior facilitating their co-existence.