Exposure to a fungal pathogen increases the critical thermal minimum of two frog species Datasets

<p>This dataset contains data from a laboratory experiment described in the paper: Siddons, S. R., and Searle, C. L. (Accepted). Exposure to a fungal pathogen increases the critical thermal minimum of two frog species. Ecology and Evolution.</p> <p>The experiment examined how exposure to a virulent fungal pathogen, <i>Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis (Bd)</i>, affected the critical thermal minimum (CT_min) of two frog species, <i>Hyla versicolor</i> (gray treefrog) and <i>Lithobates palustris</i> (pickerel frog). The CT_min is the minimum thermal performance point of an organism, which we estimated via righting response trials.</p> <p>For both frog species, the frogs were held in a beaker partially submerged in a circulating water at 15°C. At each 1-degree temperature decrease every 2.5 minutes, the frog was gently flipped onto their back and observed <span> </span><span> </span>for how quickly they were able to right themselves ("Decreasing" trial). Frogs were considered unable to right themselves when they did not do so within 10 seconds. Another trial was conducted for each frog ("Constant" trial<span> </span>), in which they were flipped onto their backs every 2.5 minutes while keeping the temperature at a constant 15°C.</p> <p>Main results of the experiment are that, for both species, the CT_min was higher for <i>Bd</i>-exposed frogs than unexposed frogs, and the CT_min of <i>H. versicolor</i> was higher than <i>L. palustris</i>. We also found that <i>Bd</i>-exposed frogs of both species righted themselves significantly fewer times in both decreasing and constant temperature trials. Finally, we observed higher mortality in <em>Bd</em>-exposed individuals throughout the experiment after <em>Bd</em> exposure for both species compared to unexposed individuals, with no difference between species.</p>