Abstract
Within and among populations, alkaloid defenses of the strawberry poison frog (Oophaga pumilio) vary spatially, temporally, and with life history stage. Natural variation in defense has been implicated as a critical factor in determining the level of protection afforded against predators and pathogens. Oophaga pumilio tadpoles sequester alkaloids from nutritive eggs and are, thus, entirely dependent on their mothers for their defense. However, it remains unclear how tadpole alkaloid composition relates to that of its mother and how variation in maternally provisioned defenses might result in varying levels of protection against predators. Here, we demonstrate that natural variation in the alkaloid composition of a mother frog is reflected as variation in her tadpole’s alkaloid composition. Tadpoles, like mother frogs, varied in their alkaloid composition but always contained the identical alkaloids found in their mother. Alkaloid quantity in tadpoles was highly correlated with alkaloid quantity in their mothers. Additionally, alkaloid quantity was the best predictor of tadpole palatability, wherein tadpoles with higher alkaloid quantities were less palatable. Mother frogs with greater quantities of alkaloids are, thus, providing better protection for their offspring by provisioning chemical defenses during one of the most vulnerable periods of life.
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The datasets used and/or analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.
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Acknowledgements
We thank the John Carroll University Tropical Biology class of 2019 for their help in deploying tadpole-rearing cups, especially A. Jones, M. Hatlovic, and K. Waters, as well as O. Medina-Baez, A. Perrino, J. Ryan, L. Phillip, and C. Thomas. We thank M.B. Dugas for assistance with statistical analyses. We thank M. Nichols for assistance in maintaining the GC–MS and J. Your for help with building tadpole cups. We thank the La Selva Research Station and Costa Rican government for allowing us to conduct this research, and Enrique Alonso Castro Fonseca and Orlando Vargas Ramírez for logistical support.
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OLB and RAS conceived of the project and designed the experiments. OLB, RAS, and JJJ contributed to data collection. OLB and RAS analyzed the data. OLB and RAS wrote the manuscript.
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All applicable institutional and/or national guidelines for the care and use of animals were followed. Research protocols were approved by the John Carroll University Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee (IACUC approval 1700). Costa Rican research permits “SINAC-ACC-PI-R-068–2019” and “R-037–2019-OT-CONAGEBIO" were granted by the Sistema Nacional de Áreas de Conservacion (SINAC) and the Comision Nacional para la Gestion de la Biodiversidad (CONAGEBIO), Ministerio de Ambiente y Energía, respectively. The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Flora and Flora (CITES) export permits “2019-CR4841/SJ#5863” and “2019-CR4636/SJ#5650” were granted by the Sistema Nacional de Áreas de Conservacion (SINAC) of the Costa Rican government.
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Brooks, O.L., James, J.J. & Saporito, R.A. Maternal chemical defenses predict offspring defenses in a dendrobatid poison frog. Oecologia 201, 385–396 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00442-023-05314-z
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00442-023-05314-z