What coloration brings: Implications of background adaptation to oxidative stress in anurans

Urban development results in habitat destruction, affecting populations of amphibians, the most fragile group of vertebrates. With changes in the environment, these animals become more exposed to light and predators. To enhance their chances of survival, they display plasticity of body coloration. Aside from adaptive benefits, animals exhibiting background matching meet the energetic costs and restrictions of changing body tones. To study the physiological consequences of Hyla arborea tadpole adaptation to background color, we followed oxidative stress parameters after rearing larvae on a constant background (black/white) and after changing the background color.

Larvae cultivated for 20 days on constant substrate color exhibited differences in body coloration but without differences in lipid peroxidation (LPO) concentration between dark and pale individuals, suggesting that coloration investment during this period did not induce higher oxidative damage in darker tadpoles. Prolonged exposure of larvae (37 days) to a dark habitat increased antioxidative system defense and LPO concentrations, compared to animals reared permanently in the white surroundings. The positive correlation of oxidative damage with color intensity of individuals points to the physiological consequences of higher investment in the number of pigment cells necessary for dark pigmentation. In individuals faced with non-matching background and change in body coloration, defense system declined and LPO occurred relative to individuals cultivated in white habitat.

Here, we have pointed to consequences related to background matching and stress that amphibians experienced during chromatic adaptations. Background color change causes a complex physiological response affecting the antioxidative defense parameters. This investigation elucidates the accompanying cost of amphibians' adjustment to an altered environment.