Abiotic environmental factors contribute to spatial variation in boldness and exploration in guppies (Poecilia reticulata).

ABSTRACT: Research on wild fishes has tended to overlook the role of abiotic factors in shaping behaviours associated with boldness and exploration. This oversight could exist because small-scale variation in the abiotic environment might seem unlikely to influence such behaviours. We challenged this assumption through research in the Trinidadian guppy (Poecilia reticulata) system. We started by quantifying how behaviours associated with boldness (time in a shelter and time frozen in an open field) and a behaviour associated with exploration (number of grid squares crossed in an open field) varied for guppies within and among 15 pools across two streams, where all of the pools within a stream were within 150 m of each other. The measured behaviours differed little between streams, yet they varied dr

SUBMITTER: Heckley AM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12360144 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature