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Metabarcoding prey DNA from fecal samples of adult dragonflies shows no predicted sex differences, and substantial inter-individual variation, in diets

Sexes often differ in foraging and diet, which is associated with sex differences in size, trophic morphology, use of habitats, and/or life history tactics. Herein, strikingly similar diets were found for adult sexes of a dragonfly (Leucorrhinia intacta), based on comparing 141 dietary taxa identifi...

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Autores principales: Morrill, André, Kaunisto, Kari M., Mlynarek, Julia J., Sippola, Ella, Vesterinen, Eero J., Forbes, Mark R.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: PeerJ Inc. 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8686731/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35003931
http://dx.doi.org/10.7717/peerj.12634
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author Morrill, André
Kaunisto, Kari M.
Mlynarek, Julia J.
Sippola, Ella
Vesterinen, Eero J.
Forbes, Mark R.
author_facet Morrill, André
Kaunisto, Kari M.
Mlynarek, Julia J.
Sippola, Ella
Vesterinen, Eero J.
Forbes, Mark R.
author_sort Morrill, André
collection PubMed
description Sexes often differ in foraging and diet, which is associated with sex differences in size, trophic morphology, use of habitats, and/or life history tactics. Herein, strikingly similar diets were found for adult sexes of a dragonfly (Leucorrhinia intacta), based on comparing 141 dietary taxa identified from the metabarcoding of mitochondrial DNA archived in feces. Arthropods in > 5% of samples included five species of dipterans, two hemipterans, two spider species and one parasitic mite. The mite was not traditional prey as its presence was likely due to DNA contamination of samples arising through parasitism or possibly via accidental consumption during grooming, and therefore the mite was excluded from diet characterizations. Common prey species were found with statistically indistinguishable frequencies in male and female diets, with one exception of an aphid more often found in male diets, although this pattern was not robust to corrections for multiple statistical tests. While rare prey species were often found in diets of only one sex, instances of this were more frequent in the more oft-sampled females, suggesting sampling artefact. Sexes did not differ in the mean prey species richness in their diets. Overall, sexes showed statistically indistinguishable diets both on a prey species-by-species basis and in terms of multivariate characterizations of diet composition, derived from presence-absence data of prey species analyzed via PERMANOVA and accumulation curves. Males and females may have similar diets by being both opportunistic and generalist predators of arthropods, using the same foraging habitats and having similar sizes and flight agilities. Notably, similarities in diet between sexes occur alongside large interindividual differences in diet, within sexes. Researchers intending on explaining adaptive sex differences in diet should consider characteristics of species whose sexes show similar diets.
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spelling pubmed-86867312022-01-07 Metabarcoding prey DNA from fecal samples of adult dragonflies shows no predicted sex differences, and substantial inter-individual variation, in diets Morrill, André Kaunisto, Kari M. Mlynarek, Julia J. Sippola, Ella Vesterinen, Eero J. Forbes, Mark R. PeerJ Animal Behavior Sexes often differ in foraging and diet, which is associated with sex differences in size, trophic morphology, use of habitats, and/or life history tactics. Herein, strikingly similar diets were found for adult sexes of a dragonfly (Leucorrhinia intacta), based on comparing 141 dietary taxa identified from the metabarcoding of mitochondrial DNA archived in feces. Arthropods in > 5% of samples included five species of dipterans, two hemipterans, two spider species and one parasitic mite. The mite was not traditional prey as its presence was likely due to DNA contamination of samples arising through parasitism or possibly via accidental consumption during grooming, and therefore the mite was excluded from diet characterizations. Common prey species were found with statistically indistinguishable frequencies in male and female diets, with one exception of an aphid more often found in male diets, although this pattern was not robust to corrections for multiple statistical tests. While rare prey species were often found in diets of only one sex, instances of this were more frequent in the more oft-sampled females, suggesting sampling artefact. Sexes did not differ in the mean prey species richness in their diets. Overall, sexes showed statistically indistinguishable diets both on a prey species-by-species basis and in terms of multivariate characterizations of diet composition, derived from presence-absence data of prey species analyzed via PERMANOVA and accumulation curves. Males and females may have similar diets by being both opportunistic and generalist predators of arthropods, using the same foraging habitats and having similar sizes and flight agilities. Notably, similarities in diet between sexes occur alongside large interindividual differences in diet, within sexes. Researchers intending on explaining adaptive sex differences in diet should consider characteristics of species whose sexes show similar diets. PeerJ Inc. 2021-12-17 /pmc/articles/PMC8686731/ /pubmed/35003931 http://dx.doi.org/10.7717/peerj.12634 Text en ©2021 Morrill et al. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, reproduction and adaptation in any medium and for any purpose provided that it is properly attributed. For attribution, the original author(s), title, publication source (PeerJ) and either DOI or URL of the article must be cited.
spellingShingle Animal Behavior
Morrill, André
Kaunisto, Kari M.
Mlynarek, Julia J.
Sippola, Ella
Vesterinen, Eero J.
Forbes, Mark R.
Metabarcoding prey DNA from fecal samples of adult dragonflies shows no predicted sex differences, and substantial inter-individual variation, in diets
title Metabarcoding prey DNA from fecal samples of adult dragonflies shows no predicted sex differences, and substantial inter-individual variation, in diets
title_full Metabarcoding prey DNA from fecal samples of adult dragonflies shows no predicted sex differences, and substantial inter-individual variation, in diets
title_fullStr Metabarcoding prey DNA from fecal samples of adult dragonflies shows no predicted sex differences, and substantial inter-individual variation, in diets
title_full_unstemmed Metabarcoding prey DNA from fecal samples of adult dragonflies shows no predicted sex differences, and substantial inter-individual variation, in diets
title_short Metabarcoding prey DNA from fecal samples of adult dragonflies shows no predicted sex differences, and substantial inter-individual variation, in diets
title_sort metabarcoding prey dna from fecal samples of adult dragonflies shows no predicted sex differences, and substantial inter-individual variation, in diets
topic Animal Behavior
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8686731/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35003931
http://dx.doi.org/10.7717/peerj.12634
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