Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Dedication
- Contents
- List of contributors
- Prologue
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- Part I The integration of two disciplines: conservation and behavioral ecology
- 1 Introduction: the whys and the hows of conservation behavior
- 2 Evolution and conservation behavior
- 3 Learning and conservation behavior: an introduction and overview
- Part II Anthropogenic impacts on animal behavior and their implications for conservation and management
- Part III Behavior-based management: using behavioral knowledge to improve conservation and management efforts
- Part IV Behavioral indicators
- Index
- References
2 - Evolution and conservation behavior
from Part I - The integration of two disciplines: conservation and behavioral ecology
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 April 2016
Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Dedication
- Contents
- List of contributors
- Prologue
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- Part I The integration of two disciplines: conservation and behavioral ecology
- 1 Introduction: the whys and the hows of conservation behavior
- 2 Evolution and conservation behavior
- 3 Learning and conservation behavior: an introduction and overview
- Part II Anthropogenic impacts on animal behavior and their implications for conservation and management
- Part III Behavior-based management: using behavioral knowledge to improve conservation and management efforts
- Part IV Behavioral indicators
- Index
- References
Summary
All behavior occurs within the theater of evolution and hence it would be remiss to ignore evolutionary forces and outcomes when considering how behavior and conservation interact with each other. This is particularly pertinent as conservation outcomes can play out over a long time period, increasing the probability that conservation of biota will be affected by evolutionary forces and the evolutionary responses of organisms and communities to such forces.
To interweave evolutionary thinking into an approach to conservation behavior I will first, briefly, review how evolution works and offer a primer on micro-evolutionary forces. From there I will build evidence for how human alteration of the environment influences evolutionary forces and biological outcomes. Importantly, I will also layer-on a view of how macro-evolutionary patterns relate to conservation outcomes over long time periods, framed in the context of modern threats to biodiversity.
This evolutionary foundation lets me argue that behavior can lead evolution and not just be the outcome of evolutionary forces. Hence, behavioral mechanisms can alter evolutionary trajectories over a surprisingly short time period and affect conservation outcomes; a view not commonly held even among evolutionary biologists. This view will be integrated back to this book's initial framework of how behavior and conservation intersect with each other, revising the Berger-Tal et al. (2011) model to explicitly include micro- and macro-evolutionary forces, patterns and outcomes.
A BRIEF PRIMER ON MICRO-EVOLUTIONARY FORCES
Evolution is classically defined as the change in allele frequencies in a population over time (Maynard Smith & Szathmáry 1995, Stearns & Hoekstra 2005, Swaddle 2010). What this definition does not readily admit to is that this is perhaps an overly gene-centric definition of micro-evolution, yet our concept of evolution is much larger than tracking gene variants over time. Evolution is really the change in heritable variation in populations (defined broadly, as I will explain later when tackling macro-evolutionary topics) over time. By heritable variation I mean differences in a population that can be passed on from one generation to another, which can occur by many mechanisms including traditional genetic inheritance, epigenetic processes, parental effects, and some would argue by cultural inheritance also.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Conservation BehaviorApplying Behavioral Ecology to Wildlife Conservation and Management, pp. 36 - 65Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2016
References
2013. Animal Behavior: An Evolutionary Approach. edn. New York: Sinauer Associates, Inc.
1994. Sexual Selection. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
and 2006. Sexual selection and mate choice. Trends in Ecology and Evolution, 21: 296–302.Google Scholar
and 2011. Coordinating theoretical and empirical efforts to understand the linkages between organisms and environments. Integrative and Comparative Biology, 51: 653–661.Google Scholar
, and 2001. The adaptive landscape as a conceptual bridge between micro- and macroevolution. Genetica, 112–113: 9–32.Google Scholar
and 1984. On the measurement of natural and sexual selection: Theory. Evolution, 38: 709–719.Google Scholar
2005. Stress-induced variation in evolution: from behavioural plasticity to genetic assimilation. Proceedings of the Royal Society B-Biological Sciences, 272: 877–886.Google Scholar
2009. Evolutionary significance of phenotypic accommodation in novel environments: an empirical test of the Baldwin effect. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B-Biological Sciences, 364: 1125–1141.Google Scholar
, and 2013. As it happens: current directions in experimental evolution. Biology Letters, 9: 20120945.Google Scholar
2013a. Evolutionary rescue and the limits of adaptation. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 368: 20120080.Google Scholar
2013b. Evolutionary rescue of a green alga kept in the dark. Biology Letters, 9: 20120823.Google Scholar
, , et al. 2011. Integrating animal behavior and conservation biology: a conceptual framework. Behavioral Ecology, 22: 236–239.Google Scholar
2002. Moving to suburbia: ontogenetic and evolutionary consequences of life on predator-free islands. Journal of Biogeography, 29: 685–692.Google Scholar
2006. Developing an evolutionary ecology of fear: how life history and natural history traits affect disturbance tolerance in birds. Animal Behaviour, 71: 389–399.Google Scholar
2013. Nongenetic inheritance for behavioral ecologists. Behavioral Ecology, 24: 326–327.Google Scholar
, and 1998. The regulation of phenotypic plasticity of eyespots in the butterfly Bicyclus anynana. The American Naturalist, 152: 853–860.Google Scholar
, , and 2012. Individual plastic responses by males to rivals reveal mismatches between behaviour and fitness outcomes. Proceedings of the Royal Society B-Biological Sciences, 279: 2868–2876.Google Scholar
2007. Behavioural biology: an effective and relevant conservation tool. Trends in Ecology & Evolution, 22: 401–407.Google Scholar
and 2011. Endangered species and a threatened discipline: behavioural ecology. Trends in Ecology & Evolution, 26: 111–118.Google Scholar
2002. Life history and ecology influences establishment success of introduced land birds. Biological Journal of the Linnean Society, 76: 465–480.Google Scholar
, , , and 2013. Phenotypic plasticity in evolutionary rescue experiments. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 368: 20120089.Google Scholar
and 2006. The urbanization of birds: from behavioral plasticity to adaptive evolution. Journal of Ornithology, 147: 284–284.Google Scholar
and 2012. Meta-analysis at the intersection of evolutionary ecology and conservation. Evolutionary Ecology, 26: 1237–1252.Google Scholar
2009. Why Evolution is True. New York: Penguin.
1859. On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection. London: John Murray.
, , , and 2011. Anthropogenic disturbance and evolutionary parameters: a lemon shark population experiencing habitat loss. Evolutionary Applications, 4: 1–17.Google Scholar
, , and 2012. Quantitative genetics of behavioural reaction norms: genetic correlations between personality and behavioural plasticity vary across stickleback populations. Journal of Evolutionary Biology, 25: 485–496.Google Scholar
, , and 2010. Behavioural reaction norms: animal personality meets individual plasticity. Trends in Ecology & Evolution, 25: 81–89.Google Scholar
, , et al. 2003. Sexual selection affects local extinction and turnover in bird communities. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 100: 5858–5862.Google Scholar
, , and 2004. Sexual plumage differences and the outcome of game bird (Aves: Galliformes) introductions on oceanic islands. Evolutionary Ecology Research, 6: 595–606.Google Scholar
2009. The role of behavior in evolution: a search for mechanism. Evolutionary Ecology, 23: 513–531.Google Scholar
2013. Epigenetic inheritance systems act as a bridge between ecological and evolutionary timescales. Behavioral Ecology, 24: 327–328.Google Scholar
2007. Developmental environment, cultural transmission, and mate choice copying. Naturwissenschaften, 94: 651–656.Google Scholar
and 1996. Introduction to Quantitative Genetics, edn. Essex, UK: Longman.
1989. Eukaryotic transposable elements and genome evolution. Trends in Genetics, 5: 103–107.Google Scholar
1958. The Genetical Theory of Natural Selection., edn. New York: Dover.
, , et al. 2005. Candidate genes for behavioural ecology. Trends in Ecology & Evolution, 20: 96–104.Google Scholar
, and 2009. Noise pollution changes avian communities and species interactions. Current Biology, 19: 1415–1419.Google Scholar
, , , and 2006. Integrating traditional and evolutionary knowledge in biodiversity conservation: a population level case study. Ecology and Society, 11.Google Scholar
, , , and 2011. Human disturbance influences reproductive success and growth rate in California sea lions (Zalophus californianus). PLoS ONE, 6.Google Scholar
, and 2007. Mutation as a stress response and the regulation of evolvability. Critical Reviews in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, 42: 399–435.Google Scholar
, and 2007. The multifarious effects of dispersal and gene flow on contemporary adaptation. Functional Ecology, 21: 434–443.Google Scholar
, , and 2007. Adaptive versus non-adaptive phenotypic plasticity and the potential for contemporary adaptation in new environments. Functional Ecology, 21: 394–407.Google Scholar
, and 2009. Principles of Evolutionary Medicine. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
and 2013. Evolutionary rescue beyond the models. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 368: 20120093.Google Scholar
and 2013. Evolutionary rescue and adaptation to abrupt environmental change depends upon the history of stress. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 368: 20120079.Google Scholar
, , and 2013. Evolutionary rescue: an emerging focus at the intersection between ecology and evolution. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 368: 20120404.Google Scholar
, , et al. 2012. Behavioral plasticity in honey bees is associated with differences in brain microRNA transcriptome. Genes Brain and Behavior, 11: 660–670.Google Scholar
, , et al. 2012. Extinctions in ancient and modern seas. Trends in Ecology & Evolution, 27: 608–617.Google Scholar
, , , and 2013. Potential barriers to gene flow in the endangered European wildcat (Felis silvestris). Conservation Genetics, 14: 413–426.Google Scholar
, , et al. 2011. Evolutionary principles and their practical application. Evolutionary Applications, 4: 159–183.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
, , and 2010. An appraisal of the fitness consequences of forest disturbance for wildlife using habitat selection theory. Oecologia, 164: 73–86.Google Scholar
and 2002. Coevolution of costly mate choice and condition-dependent display of good genes. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London Series B-Biological Sciences, 269: 97–104.Google Scholar
1957. Gene mutations in human haemoglobin: the chemical difference between normal and sickle cell haemoglobin. Nature, 180: 326–328.Google Scholar
and 1995. Epigenetic Inheritance and Evolution: The Lamarckian Dimension. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
1987. Heritability at the species level: analysis of geographic ranges of cretaceous mollusks. Science (New York, N. Y.), 238: 360–363.Google Scholar
, , , and 2011. Dampened behavioral and physiological responses mediate birds’ association with humans. Biological Conservation, 144: 1702–1711.Google Scholar
2009. Evolutionary, behavioural and molecular ecology must meet to achieve long-term conservation goals. Molecular Ecology, 18: 3761–3762.Google Scholar
and 2007. Associations of anthropogenic activity and disturbance with fitness metrics of eastern bluebirds (Sialia sialis). Biological Conservation, 138: 189–197.Google Scholar
and 1994. Sexual selection and the evolutionary effects of copying mate choice. Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology, 34: 443–449.Google Scholar
and 2013. Evolutionary rescue by beneficial mutations in environments that change in space and time. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 368: 20120082.Google Scholar
and 2003. Sexy to die for? Sexual selection and the risk of extinction. Annales Zoologici Fennici, 40: 207–219.Google Scholar
and 2001. Ecological traps in changing environments: ecological and evolutionary consequences of a behaviourally mediated Allee effect. Evolutionary Ecology Research, 3: 537–551.Google Scholar
and 2012. Plastic responses to parents and predators lead to divergent shoaling behaviour in sticklebacks. Journal of Evolutionary Biology, 25: 759–769.Google Scholar
1994. Sexual selection with a culturally transmitted mating preference. Theoretical Population Biology, 45: 1–15.Google Scholar
1976. Natural selection and random genetic drift in phenotypic evolution. Evolution, 30: 314–334.Google Scholar
, , and 2013. Are species’ responses to global change predicted by past niche evolution?Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 368: 20120091.Google Scholar
, and 2013. A place for behavior in ecological epigenetics. Behavioral Ecology, 24: 329–330.Google Scholar
and 2011. Testing the role of phenotypic plasticity for local adaptation: growth and development in time-constrained Rana temporaria populations. Journal of Evolutionary Biology, 24: 2696–2704.Google Scholar
and 2003. Impact of human nuisance disturbance on vigilance and group size of a social ungulate. Ecological Applications, 13: 1830–1834.Google Scholar
and 2010. Applied conservation services of the evolutionary theory. Evolutionary Ecology, 24: 1381–1392.Google Scholar
and 1995. The Major Transitions in Evolution. San Francisco: W. H. Freeman.
, and 1999. Sexual selection and extinction: The fate of plumage-dimorphic and plumage-monomorphic birds introduced onto islands. Evolutionary Ecology Research, 1: 549–565.Google Scholar
and 1993. Dating the genetic bottleneck of the African cheetah. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 90: 3172–3176.Google Scholar
and 2012. Evolution and biodiversity: the evolutionary basis of biodiversity and its potential for adaptation to global change. Evolutionary Applications, 5: 103–106.Google Scholar
and 2010. Behavioural plasticity: an interaction between evolution and experience. Evolutionary Ecology, 24: 571–583.Google Scholar
, , and 2009. How do reproductive skew and founder group size affect genetic diversity in reintroduced populations?Molecular Ecology, 18: 3792–3802.Google Scholar
, , et al. 2011. The role of developmental plasticity in evolutionary innovation. Proceedings of the Royal Society B-Biological Sciences 278: 2705–2713.Google Scholar
1998. Developmental instability of plants and radiation from Chernobyl. Oikos, 81: 444–448.Google Scholar
and 1997. Asymmetry, Developmental Stability and Evolution. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
, and 2012. Phenotypic plasticity affects the response of a sexually selected trait to anthropogenic noise. Behavioral Ecology, 24: 343–348.Google Scholar
and 2003. Sexual selection and the risk of extinction in birds. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London Series B-Biological Sciences, 270: 1793–1799.Google Scholar
2004. Managing threatened species: the ecological toolbox, evolutionary theory and declining-population paradigm. Journal of Applied Ecology, 41: 413–426.Google Scholar
, , , and 2012. Fates beyond traits: ecological consequences of human-induced trait change. Evolutionary Applications, 5: 183–191.Google Scholar
, , and 2012. The effects of translocation-induced isolation and fragmentation on the cultural evolution of bird song. Ecology Letters, 15: 778–785.Google Scholar
1990. Extreme environmental stress: asymmetry, metabolic cost and conservation. In Evolutionary Genetics of Drosophila (, ed.). New York: Plenum; 75–86.
and 2005. Gene flow maintains a large genetic difference in clutch size at a small spatial scale. Nature, 433: 65–68.Google Scholar
, , and 2002. Does sexual selection influence population trends in European birds?Evolutionary Ecology Research, 4: 49–60.Google Scholar
, and 2013. Sexual selection hinders adaptation in experimental populations of yeast. Biology Letters, 9: 20121202.Google Scholar
and 1964. Induced mutation and pleiotropy of genes responsible for quantitative characters in rice. Radiation Botany, 4: 141–151.Google Scholar
1982. Genetic Effects of Ionizing Radiation in Multi-Cellular Eukaryotes and the Assessment of Genetic Radiation Hazards in Man. Amsterdam: Elsevier.
and 2009. Rapid evolution in the wild: changes in body size, life-history traits, and behavior in hunted populations of the Japanese mamushi snake. Conservation Biology, 23: 93–102.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
, , , and 2013. Limited evolutionary rescue of locally adapted populations facing climate change. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 368: 20120083.Google Scholar
, and 2002. Ecological and evolutionary traps. Trends in Ecology & Evolution, 17: 474–480.Google Scholar
and 2007. The effect of females on male–male competition in the isopod, Paracerceis sculpta: a reaction norm approach to behavioral plasticity. Journal of Crustacean Biology, 27: 417–424.Google Scholar
and 2003. Mating Systems and Strategies. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
, , , and 2010. Behavior as a key component of integrative biology in a human-altered world. Integrative and Comparative Biology, 50: 934–944.Google Scholar
1985. Gene flow in natural populations. Annual Review of Ecology and Systematics, 16: 393–430.Google Scholar
, , et al. 2008. Evolutionary consequences of human disturbance in a rainforest bird species from Central Africa. Molecular Ecology, 17: 58–71.Google Scholar
2013. The importance of epigenetics for behavioral ecologists (and vice versa). Behavioral Ecology, 24: 328–329.Google Scholar
, and 1998. Plumage dichromatism of birds predicts introduction success in New Zealand. Journal of Animal Ecology, 67: 263–269.Google Scholar
and 2005. Evolution, edn. London: Oxford University Press.
, , et al. 2013. Identification of 100 fundamental ecological questions. Journal of Ecology, 101: 58–67.Google Scholar
2010. Evolution. In Encyclopedia of Earth (, J.C, eds.). Washington, DC: National Council for Science and the Environment.
2011. Assessing the developmental stress hypothesis in the context of a reaction norm. Behavioral Ecology, 22: 13–14.Google Scholar
, , and 2005. Socially transmitted mate preferences in a monogamous bird: a non-genetic mechanism of sexual selection. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London B-Biological Sciences, 272: 1053–1058.Google Scholar
1996. Sexual selection enhances population extinction in a changing environment. Journal of Theoretical Biology, 180: 197–206.Google Scholar
and 2011. Behavioural responses to human-induced environmental change. Biological Reviews, 86: 640–657.Google Scholar
, and 2011. Adaptive phenotypic differentiation of courtship in response to recent anthropogenic disturbance. Evolutionary Ecology Research, 13: 697–710.Google Scholar
, and 2005. Mate-choice copying as Bayesian decision making. American Naturalist, 165: 403–410.Google Scholar
and 2011. When are genes “leaders” or “followers” in evolution?Trends in Ecology & Evolution, 26: 435–436.Google Scholar
2012. Changing organisms in rapidly changing anthropogenic landscapes: the significance of the Umwelt’-concept and functional habitat for animal conservation. Evolutionary Applications, 5: 144–153.Google Scholar
, , and 2013. Evolutionary rescue in vertebrates: evidence, applications and uncertainty. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 368: 20120090.Google Scholar
and 2007. Theory of Games and Economic Behavior (commemorative edition). Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
2003. Developmental Plasticity and Evolution. Oxford University Press.
and 2000. “Culture” in quail: social influences on mate choices of female Coturnix japonica.Animal Behaviour, 59: 975–979.Google Scholar
2012. Assessing the impacts of phenotypic plasticity on evolution. Integrative and Comparative Biology, 52: 5–15.Google Scholar
, and 2011. Comparing the effects of rapid evolution and phenotypic plasticity on predator–prey dynamics. American Naturalist, 178: 287–304.Google Scholar
2003. Evolution by gene duplication: an update. Trends in Ecology & Evolution, 18: 292–298.Google Scholar