Long-term patterns of forearm asymmetry in females of three syntopic bat species and its effects on individual fitness.

ABSTRACT: Fluctuating asymmetry, the non-directional deviation from bilateral symmetry resulting from developmental instability, can indicate early-life environmental stress. While fluctuating asymmetry can affect individual survival and reproductive success, its effect on fitness differs between species. Here, we analyzed up to 27 years of mark-recapture data from 894 RFID tagged individuals of three forest-living bat species in southern Germany to investigate the degree of fluctuating asymmetry in forearm length. In Bechstein's bats, Myotis bechsteinii, the species with the highest sample size, we furthermore investigated if fluctuating asymmetry has become more frequent over the study period, a time when juvenile bats have grown larger forearms in response to warmer summers. We also investigated

SUBMITTER: Suess T 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11579011 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature