Size selection by a gape-limited predator of a marine snail: Insights into magic traits for speciation.

ABSTRACT: The intertidal snail Littorina saxatilis has repeatedly evolved two parallel ecotypes assumed to be wave adapted and predatory shore crab adapted, but the magnitude and targets of predator-driven selection are unknown. In Spain, a small, wave ecotype with a large aperture from the lower shore and a large, thick-shelled crab ecotype from the upper shore meet in the mid-shore and show partial size-assortative mating. We performed complementary field tethering and laboratory predation experiments; the first set compared the survival of two different size-classes of the crab ecotype while the second compared the same size-class of the two ecotypes. In the first set, the large size-class of the crab ecotype survived significantly better than the small size-class both on the upper shore a

SUBMITTER: Boulding EG 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5243190 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature