Phenotypic plasticity in life history and behavioural syndromes in short lived, iteroparous small mammals.

如果世代之间的环境不同，就很难适应环境条件。在季节性环境中，短命动物可能在春夏或秋季出生。春夏出生的动物成熟快，与同种动物的繁殖竞争激烈，寿命较短。相比之下，它们的后代可能在秋天出生，必须在冬天生存，成熟的年龄相对较高，与夏季动物相比，寿命相对较长。此外，在早春与同种植物的竞争较低。我们认为，随着这些不同的生活史，也进化出了不同的行为类型，这些行为类型有助于在竞争环境中成功繁殖或提高冬季存活率。我们发现，在普通的田鼠种群中，一种生活在季节性环境中的短寿命、穴居动物，在春季测量的行为特征与在夏季和秋季测量的行为特征不同。测量的变量在个体的一生中是恒定的。除了男性的体力活动较多外，性别之间没有差异。在精细实验室中测量的春/夏动物之间的行为差异在野外情况下也可以观察到，这表明行为概况在实验室环境之外的相关性。另一方面，从夏季转移到人工冬季的动物的行为类型是灵活的。在未来的实验中，我们希望将冬季动物转移到人工夏季进行这项实验，以测试我们是否观察到行为个体发生中的普遍季节性不匹配，还是季节性特定现象。我们想进一步研究动物在半自然环境中不同行为类型的混合种群中的适应性，使用自动无线电遥测，生命捕获和分子亲子分析。我们的研究结果将帮助我们了解生命史的可变性、季节性变化的环境和不同的生活节奏综合症对动物行为的影响。

If the environment varies between generations, adaptation to environmental conditions is difficult. In seasonal environments, short-lived animals may be born into spring/summer or autumn. Spring/summer-born animals mature quickly, their competition with conspecifics for reproduction is high, and life span is rather short. Their offspring, in contrast, may be born into autumn, have to survive the winter, mature at a relatively high age and have a relatively long life-span compared to summer animals. Further, in early spring competition with conspecifics is low. We assume, that with these different life-histories also different behavioural types have evolved, which facilitate successful reproduction in competitive situations or improve winter survival. We showed that in common vole populations, a short-lived, iteroparous animal in a seasonal environment, behavioural profiles measured in spring differ from those measured in summer and autumn. The measured variables are constant over the life of individuals. They do not differ between sexes, with the exception of higher physical activity in males. Behavioural differences measured between spring/summer animals in fine lab remained observable also in a field situation, indicating the relevance of behavioural profiles beyond the laboratory environment. On the other hand, behavioural types were flexible in animals which were transferred from summer to an artificial winter. In future experiments we want to conduct this experiment with winter animals transferred to artificial summers, to test whether we observe a general seasonal mismatch in the ontogeny of behaviour, or a season specific phenomenon. We want to further investigate the fitness of animals in mixed populations of different behavioural types in semi-natural enclosures, using automated radiotelemetry, life-capture and molecular paternity analyses. The result of our research will help us to understand the effects of variability in life histories, seasonally variable environments and different pace-of-life syndromes on the behaviour of animals.