Rolling in the deep: morphological variation as an adaptation to different nesting behaviours of coprophagous Scarabaeoi
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ORIGINAL ARTICLE
Rolling in the deep: morphological variation as an adaptation to different nesting behaviours of coprophagous Scarabaeoidea Jure Jugovic 1
&
Nataša Koprivnikar 1
Received: 18 June 2019 / Accepted: 12 October 2020 # institute of Zoology, Slovak Academy of Sciences 2020
Abstract In a local community of closely related species exploiting the same food source its abundance as a strong selective pressure directs the ecological niche partitioning that can be mirrored in different life-history traits. In dung beetles (Scarabaeoidea) that feed on patchy and timely limited excrements of large vertebrates, competition is mirrored in their specific adaptations in behaviour and morphology. In a local community from Slovenia, we sought for a morphological variation of 36 morphological traits in 28 dung beetle species belonging to two families (Scarabaeidae, Geotrupidae) that can be linked to their evolutionary background (family, subfamily, tribe, species) and their life style (i.e. nesting behaviour: rollers, dwellers, tunnelers). We showed that morphological traits specific for each ecomorphological group reflect the functional adaptations to their life strategies of nesting behaviour, but also phylogenetic (family, subfamily) membership. The unique combinations of evolutionary background and same life styles within/among different phylogenetic lineages (families, subfamilies, tribes) revealed the morphological traits that are a result of different evolutionary scenarios (convergences/divergences between members of different/same phylogenetic lineage with same/different life nesting behaviour). At least four (Aphodiinae – dwellers, Geotrupinae – tunnelers, Scarabaeinae – tunnelers, Scarabaeinae – rollers) ecomorphological groups were recognised from a local community, but an existence of a possible fifth group represented by Coprimorphus scrutator of Aphodiinae indicates that the ecomorphological differentiation exists also at a smaller scale. Finally, by the quantification of gaps in morphological space between the pairs of defined ecomorphological groups we showed that the guild membership overrides the family/subfamily membership in a light of ecomorphological adaptations to specific nesting behaviours. Keywords Adaptation . Dung beetles . Ecomorphological groups . Functional morphology . Guilds . Morphological evolution
Introduction In local assemblages of any closely related taxa exploring the same limited sources a competition leads to either extinction of less successful taxa or niche partitioning. There may be competition for space (interferential competition) or other sources organisms essentially need for their existence Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (https://doi.org/10.2478/s11756-020-00627-3) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. * Jure Jugovic [email protected] 1
Department of Biodiversity, Faculty of Mathematics, Natural Sciences and Information Technologies, University of Primorska, Glagoljaška 8, 6000 Koper, Slo
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