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Does Early-Life Food Shortage Alter Female Life History at Elevated Temperatures?
The American Naturalist
|March 19, 2026
Summary
Global warming impacts aquatic life. Higher temperatures, not food scarcity, significantly altered guppy life history, increasing adult mortality and reducing offspring size.
Area of Science:
- Ecology
- Evolutionary Biology
- Aquatic Biology
Background:
- Global warming is reducing food availability in aquatic ecosystems.
- Higher temperatures can accelerate ectotherm growth and reproduction.
- Resource depletion may constrain temperature-driven life history changes.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the combined effects of elevated water temperature and restricted early-life food availability on adult female guppy life history traits.
- To determine if food limitation mitigates or exacerbates temperature effects on fish reproduction and survival.
Main Methods:
- Experimental manipulation of water temperature (24°C vs. 28°C) and early-life food availability (control vs. restricted) in female guppies (Poecilia reticulata).
- Assessment of adult life history traits including growth, reproduction (offspring number and size), mortality, gut length, immunity, and telomere length.
Main Results:
- No significant interaction between temperature and food availability on adult traits.
- Higher temperature (28°C) alone significantly affected female life histories.
- Females at 28°C exhibited slower growth post-early adulthood, produced fewer, smaller offspring, and had higher adult mortality compared to 24°C.
- Temperature effects on reproduction persisted independent of female size, indicating a shifted fecundity-size relationship.
- Elevated temperatures led to longer guts but did not impact immunity or telomere length.
Conclusions:
- Tropical fish, like guppies, may be vulnerable to rising temperatures.
- Guppies demonstrated resilience to brief periods of early-life food limitation.
- Elevated temperatures can negatively impact fish life history and survival, independent of food availability.
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