Moreno-Rueda Gregorio, Requena-Blanco Abelardo, Zamora-Camacho Francisco J, Comas Mar, Pascual Guillem
Departamento de Zoología, Facultad de Ciencias, Universidad de Granada, Granada, E-18071, Spain.
Department of Biological Sciences, Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH, 03055, USA.
Curr Zool. 2020 Aug;66(4):417-424. doi: 10.1093/cz/zoz062. Epub 2019 Dec 10.
Predation is one of the main selective forces in nature, frequently selecting potential prey for developing escape strategies. Escape ability is typically influenced by several morphological parameters, such as morphology of the locomotor appendices, muscular capacity, body mass, or fluctuating asymmetry, and may differ between sexes and age classes. In this study, we tested the relationship among these variables and jumping performance in 712 Iberian green frogs from an urban population. The results suggest that the main determinant of jumping capacity was body size (explaining 48% of variance). Larger frogs jumped farther, but jumping performance reached an asymptote for the largest frogs. Once controlled by structural body size, the heaviest frogs jumped shorter distances, suggesting a trade-off between fat storage and jumping performance. Relative hind limb length also determined a small but significant percentage of variance (2.4%) in jumping performance-that is, the longer the hind limbs, the greater the jumping capacity. Juveniles had relatively shorter and less muscular hind limbs than adults (for a given body size), and their jumping performance was poorer. In our study population, the hind limbs of the frogs were very symmetrical, and we found no effect of fluctuating asymmetry on jumping performance. Therefore, our study provides evidence that jumping performance in frogs is not only affected by body size, but also by body mass and hind limb length, and differ between age classes.
捕食是自然界主要的选择力量之一，常常促使潜在猎物发展出逃避策略。逃避能力通常受几个形态学参数影响，比如运动附肢的形态、肌肉能力、体重或波动不对称性，而且在性别和年龄组之间可能有所不同。在本研究中，我们测试了来自城市种群的712只伊比利亚绿蛙的这些变量与跳跃能力之间的关系。结果表明，跳跃能力的主要决定因素是体型大小（解释了48%的变异）。体型较大的青蛙跳得更远，但对于体型最大的青蛙来说，跳跃能力达到了一个渐近值。一旦控制了身体结构大小，最重的青蛙跳得距离较短，这表明在脂肪储存和跳跃能力之间存在权衡。相对后肢长度也在跳跃能力的变异中占了一小部分但显著的比例（2.4%）——也就是说，后肢越长，跳跃能力越强。在相同体型下，幼蛙的后肢相对较短且肌肉较少，它们的跳跃能力也较差。在我们的研究种群中，青蛙的后肢非常对称，我们没有发现波动不对称性对跳跃能力有影响。因此，我们的研究提供了证据，表明青蛙的跳跃能力不仅受体型大小影响，还受体重和后肢长度影响，并且在不同年龄组之间存在差异。
