Adaptations and evolution in a highly anthropogenic ecosystem: Between urban ecology and impacted natural environments
Abstract
Anthropogenic changes are occurring at a rapid pace across the planet and are reducing or altering the habitats of many animal and plant species. Human activities impose new selective pressures on living organisms by altering native habitats and creating new biotopes where microclimates, pollution (light, noise, and chemical), habitat fragmentation are strongly impacting wildlife.
While some animals manage to adapt to this new environmental conditions, they appear to undergo significant changes in their characteristics (phenotypes), and the relative importance of ecological versus evolutionary processes in these changes remains poorly understood. Long-term monitoring studies certified by CNRS Ecology & Environment, centered on tit populations as a flagship model at the national level, enable the study of the behavioral, physiological, and/or genetic adaptations—as well as their limitations—of these organisms to the global changes of the Anthropocene. These studies draw on the complementary nature of an urban ecology approach—which utilizes the environmental gradient created by urbanization (temperature, vegetation, habitat fragmentation, and pollution)—and a comparative, multi-population, non-urban approach at the national and European scales.
There are currently three long-term monitoring programmes of the CEFE Tit Project that are supported by SEE-Life:
– Tit monitoring in an urban gradient in Montpellier
(PI: Anne Charmantier)
History
The first nest boxes monitored since 2007; 8 urban sites across the city of Montpellier where the breeding of great tits has been monitored since 2011, including measurements of the birds’ morphology, reproductive traits, behavior, and cognitive abilities, as well as their physiology, and sampling for genetic and epigenetic analyses.
Main questions
– The role of genetic variation and plasticity in morphological, physiological, behavioral, cognitive, and life history differences among birds along the urbanization gradient,
– Using phylogenetic analyses, we assess the genetic basis of the differences observed between urban and forest birds. We also use community garden experiments to understand the genetic or plastic origins of these differences.
– We test the hypothesis that trait plasticity and appropriate habitat selection reinforce divergence processes between more and less urbanized habitats.
– Monitoring of blue and great tits in a Mediterrannean forest at La Rouvière, Montarnaud
(PI: Céline Teplitsky)
History
The monitoring of blue and great tits began in 1991 at La Rouvière, a downy oak forest 20 km from Montpellier. This is a breeding monitoring program using nest boxes. The study began with 103 nest boxes, doubled in 2009, and today more than 220 nest boxes are monitored each year in three areas with varying densities.
Main questions
– Adaptations to climate change, particularly through changes in phenology or behavior (personality and communication)
– Evolution of life history traits and color: Characterization of genetic variability and selection pressures related to environmental effects.
– Corsican blue tits in deciduous and evergreen forests (PI: Claire Doutrelant)
to come…
Main people involved
PI: Anne Charmantier, Claire Doutrelant, Céline Teplitsky
Collaborators: all people from the CEFE Tit Project