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Updated: May 17, 2026

Incremental Temperature Changes for Maximal Breeding and Spawning in Astyanax mexicanus

Incremental Temperature Changes for Maximal Breeding and Spawning in Astyanax mexicanus

Published on: February 14, 2021

The evolution of intermittent breeding.

Allison K Shaw¹, Simon A Levin

¹Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ 08544, USA. allison.shaw@anu.edu.au

Journal of Mathematical Biology

|October 19, 2012

Summary

This summary is machine-generated.

Organisms may skip reproduction to balance survival and energy costs. Our model shows the evolutionarily stable strategy for intermittent breeding depends on growth, mortality, and environmental conditions.

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Area of Science:

Evolutionary Biology
Life History Theory
Population Dynamics

Background:

Organisms often face trade-offs between current and future reproduction.
Intermittent breeding, where adults skip breeding opportunities, is a strategy thought to mitigate reproductive costs (survival, energy, recovery).

Purpose of the Study:

To develop a matrix population model for intermittent breeding.
To determine conditions favoring continuous versus intermittent breeding using adaptive dynamics.
To investigate the impact of environmental stochasticity on breeding strategies.

Main Methods:

Developed a matrix population model incorporating intermittent breeding.
Applied adaptive dynamics to find evolutionarily stable strategies (ESS) for breeding behavior.
Analyzed the influence of reproductive costs (survival, energy, recovery) and environmental factors.

Main Results:

The ESS for breeding behavior is contingent on individual growth and mortality rates.
Skipped breeding is favored under specific reproductive cost types and environmental conditions.
Constant environments yield a pure ESS, while stochasticity or population fluctuations can lead to a mixed ESS.

Conclusions:

Reproductive scheduling is a complex evolutionary strategy influenced by demographic rates and environmental variability.
The model provides a framework for understanding intermittent breeding across diverse taxa.
Environmental stochasticity can drive the evolution of mixed breeding strategies.