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907 results for “tadpole”
Laboratory study on microplastic fiber size and concentration effects on leopard frog (Lithobates pipiens) tadpole survival, development, behavior, and parasite susceptibility
This dataset contains comprehensive raw data from a completed laboratory experiment conducted from May 24 to June 30, 2021 (with additional analysis performed in 2025), investigating the effects of polyester microplastic (MP) fiber exposure on northern leopard frog (Lithobates pipiens) tadpoles and their interactions with echinostome trematodes (Echinostoma sp.). Tadpole egg masses were collected from a wetland in Indiana, USA, and ramshorn snails (Helisoma trivolvis), serving as trematode hosts, were collected from Tioga County, New York, USA. The experiment was conducted under controlled laboratory conditions using a static-renewal design, exposing tadpoles to short (~0.24 mm) or long (~1.50 mm) polyester MP fibers at concentrations of 0, 10, or 40 µg L⁻¹ for 32 days, followed by controlled exposure to echinostome cercariae. The dataset includes measurements of tadpole mortality, developmental traits (mass, snout-to-vent length, Gosner stage), behavioral activity (number of moving pre- and post-parasite exposure), MP fiber ingestion, and susceptibility to trematode infection (metacercarial cyst counts in kidneys). These data provide a resource for studying the ecological and toxicological impacts of microplastics on amphibian health, and host-parasite dynamics in freshwater ecosystems, making the dataset suitable for researchers in ecotoxicology, and disease ecology. The dataset is complete, with no ongoing data collection, and is designed to support analyses of microplastic-mediated effects on aquatic organisms.
Selection for phenotypic plasticity in Rana sylvatica tadpoles, 1998.
The hypothesis that phenotypic plasticity is an adaptation to environmental variation rests on the two assumptions that plasticity improves the performance of individuals that possess it, and that it evolved in response to selection imposed in heterogeneous environments. The first assumption has been upheld by studies showing the beneficial nature of plasticity. The second assumption is difficult to test since it requires knowing about selection acting in the past. However, it can be tested in its general form by asking whether natural selection currently acts to maintain phenotypic plasticity. We adopted this approach in a study of plastic morphological traits in larvae of the wood frog, Rana sylvatica. First we reared tadpoles in artificial ponds for 18 days, in either the presence or absence of Anax dragonfly larvae (confined within cages to prevent them from killing the tadpoles). These conditioning treatments produced dramatic differences in size and shape: tadpoles from ponds with predators were smaller and had relatively short bodies and deep tail fins. We estimated selection by Anax on the two kinds of tadpoles by testing for non-random mortality in overnight predation trials. Dragonflies imposed strong selection by preferentially killing individuals with relatively shallow and short tail fins, and narrow tail muscles. The same traits that exhibited the strongest plasticity were under the strongest selection, except that tail muscle width exhibited no plasticity but experienced strong increasing selection. A laboratory competition experiment, testing for selection in the absence of predators, showed that tadpoles with deep tail fins grew relatively slowly. In the cattle tanks, where there were also no free predators, the predator-induced phenotype survived more poorly and developed slowly, but this cost was apparently not associated with particular morphological traits. These results indicate that selection is currently promoting morphological plasticity in
Data from: Understanding the Influence of Check Dam and Season on Habitat Use to Develop Habitat Suitability Criteria for Overwintering Tadpoles of Nanorana spp.
<p>Dataset for the article: Understanding the Influence of Check Dam and Season on Habitat Use to Develop Habitat Suitability Criteria for Overwintering Tadpoles of <em>Nanorana</em> spp.</p> <p>See readme.txt for details.</p>
Growth, development, activity, and survival of wood frog tadpoles from different populations in eastern NY in 2022.
These data were collected as two lab experiments that examined larval (i.e., tadpole) wood frog populations. The first was a time-to-death experiment in which we exposed individuals tadpoles to either a control or lethal concentrations of NaCl. The second was a growth and development experiment in which we raised tadpoles from the same populations in a sublethal concentration of NaCl for several weeks to examine their growth and development (i.e. Gosner developmental stage).
The heritability of inducible defenses in tadpoles.
The evolution of plastic traits requires phenotypic trade-offs and heritable traits, yet the latter requirement has received little attention, especially for predatorinduced traits. Using a half-sib design, I examined the narrow-sense heritability of predator-induced behaviour, morphology, and life history in larval wood frogs (Rana sylvatica). Many of the traits had significant additive genetic variation in predator (caged Anax longipes) and no-predator environments. Whereas most traits had moderate to high heritability across environments, tail depth exhibited high heritability with predators but low heritability without predators. In addition, several traits had significant heritability for plasticity, suggesting a potential for selection to act on plasticity per se. Genetic correlations confirmed known phenotypic relationships across environments and identified novel relationships within each environment. This appears to be the first investigation of narrow-sense heritabilities for predator-induced traits and confirms that inducible traits previously shown to be under selection also have a genetic basis and should be capable of exhibiting evolutionary responses.
Synergistic impacts of malathion and predatory stress on six species of North American tadpoles.
The decline of many amphibian populations is associated with pesticides, but for most pesticides we know little about their toxicity to amphibians. Malathion is a classic example; it is sprayed over aquatic habitats to control mosquitoes that carry malaria and the West Nile virus, yet we know little about its effect on amphibians. I examined the survival of six species of tadpoles (wood frogs, Rana sylvatica; leopard frogs, R. pipiens; green frogs, R. clamitans; bullfrogs, R. catesbeiana; American toads, Bufo americanus; and gray tree frogs, Hyla versicolor) for 16 d in the presence or absence of predatory stress and six concentrations of malathion. Malathion was moderately toxic to all species of tadpoles (median lethal concentration [LC50] values, the concentration estimated to kill 50% of a test population, ranged from 1.25–5.9 mg/L). These values are within the range of values reported for the few amphibians that have been tested (0.2–42 mg/L). In one of the six species, malathion became twice as lethal when combined with predatory stress. Similar synergistic interactions have been found with the insecticide carbaryl, suggesting that the synergy may occur in many carbamate and organophosphate insecticides. While malathion has the potential to kill amphibians and its presence is correlated with habitats containing declining populations, its actual role in amphibian declines is uncertain given the relatively low concentration in aquatic habitats.
The lethal impacts of Roundup and predatory stress on six species of North American tadpoles.
The decline in amphibians across the globe has sparked a search for the causes, and recent evidence suggests a connection with pesticides. However, for most pesticides, tests on amphibians are rare and conducted only for short durations (1 to 4 days) and without natural stressors. Recent studies have discovered that the stress of predator cues in the water can make insecticides much more lethal to larval amphibians, but it is unknown whether this phenomenon can be generalized to other types of pesticides. Using six species of North American amphibian larvae (Rana sylvatica, R. pipiens, R. clamitans, R. catesbeiana, Bufo americanus, and Hyla versicolor), I examined the impact of a globally common herbicide (Roundup) on the survival of tadpoles for 16days with and without the chemical cues emitted by predatory newts (Notophthalmus viridescens). LC5016-d estimates varied from 0.55 to 2.52 mg of active ingredient (AI)/L, which was considerably lower than the few previous studies using Roundup (1.5 to 15.5 mg AI/L). Moreover, in one of the six species tested (R. sylvatica), the addition of predatory stress made Roundup twice as lethal. This discovery suggests that synergistic interactions between predatory stress and pesticides may indeed be a generalizable phenomenon in amphibians that occurs with a wide variety of pesticides.
Relyea, R. A. 2002. Local population differences in phenotypic plasticity: Predator-induced changes in wood frog tadpoles. Ecological Monographs 72:77-93
Taxa that are divided into separate populations with low levels of interpopulation dispersal have the potential to evolve genetically based differences in their phenotypes and the plasticity of those phenotypes. These differences can be due to random processes, including genetic drift and founder effects, or they can be the result of different selection pressures among populations. I investigated population-level differences in predator- induced phenotypic plasticity in eight populations of larval wood frogs (Rana sylvatica) over a small geographic scale (interpopulation distances of 0.3–8 km). Using a common-garden experiment containing predator and no-predator environments, I found population differences in behavior, morphology, and life history. These responses exhibited a habitat-related pattern: the four populations from closed-canopy ponds did not differ from each other in any of their phenotypes whereas the four populations from opencanopy ponds did differ from each other in these traits. This phenotypic pattern matches the pattern of competitors and predators found in these two types of ponds. Based on two years of pond surveys, the four closed-canopy ponds contained very similar competitor and predator assemblages while the assemblages of the four open-canopy ponds were more diverse and highly variable among open-canopy ponds. When combined with past studies, which demonstrate that predators and competitors select for alternative behavioral and morphological traits, these patterns suggest that the population differences may have arisen via natural selection and not via random mutation or drift. In a second experiment, I cross-transplanted two of the populations into each other’s ponds to determine if the populations were locally adapted to the conditions of their native pond (using low and high competition crossed with the presence or absence of a lethal predator). The populations continued to exhibit phenotypic differences, and one of the two populations t
Relyea, R. A., and N. Mills. 2001. Predator-induced stress makes the pesticide carbaryl more deadly to grey treefrog tadpoles (Hyla versicolor). PNAS 98:2491-2496.
Global declines in amphibians likely have multiple causes, including widespread pesticide use. Our knowledge of pesticide effects on amphibians is largely limited to short-term (4-d) toxicity tests conducted under highly artificial conditions to determine lethal concentrations (LC50). We found that if we used slightly longer exposure times (10–16 d), low concentrations of the pesticide carbaryl (3–4% of LC504-d) killed 10–60% of gray treefrog (Hyla versicolor) tadpoles. If predatory cues also were present, the pesticide became 2–4 times more lethal, killing 60–98% of tadpoles. Thus, under more realistic conditions of increased exposure times and predatory stress, current application rates for carbaryl can potentially devastate gray treefrog populations. Further, because predator-induced stress is ubiquitous in animals and carbaryl’s mode of action is common to many pesticides, these negative impacts may be widespread in nature.
Relyea, R. A. 2001. The lasting effects of adaptive plasticity: Predator-induced tadpoles become long-legged frogs. Ecology 82:1947-1955.
Changes in environmental conditions often alter the traits of individuals; however, we have a poor understanding of how changes in phenotypically plastic traits early in development may affect traits later in life. Such effects are of particular interest in organisms with complex life cycles in which early and late life stages can have drastically different morphologies and occupy different habitats. In this study, I examined how differences in the mass, morphology, and larval period of wood frog tadpoles (Rana sylvatica) subsequently affected the mass and morphology of metamorphic frogs. I found three major patterns: (1) larval mass and larval period were positively related to metamorphic mass; (2) larval period was positively related to metamorph hindlimb and forelimb length and negatively related to metamorph body width; and (3) larval body length was positively related to metamorph forelimb size. I then used these correlations to interpret the connection between the traits of predator-induced tadpoles and the subsequent traits of metamorphic frogs. Tadpoles reared with caged predators (aeshnid dragonflies) developed relatively deeper tail fins and had shorter bodies, lower mass, and longer developmental times than tadpoles reared without predators. Metamorphs emerging from larval predator environments exhibited no differences in mass but developed relatively large hindlimbs and forelimbs and narrower bodies than metamorphs emerging from predator-free larval environments. These differences arose primarily due to predator-induced changes in larval development time and not due to the predator-induced changes in larval morphology. By focusing on a large number of traits and a wide range of trait values, one can readily generate predictions about how a variety of environments, which alter traits early in development, can subsequently alter traits later in development.
Figure 3 in Morphology, natural history and molecular identification of tadpoles of three endemic frog species of Nyctibatrachus Boulenger, 1882 (Anura: Nyctibatrachidae) from Central Western Ghats, India
Figure 3. Tadpole of N. jog, BNHS 5900. (a) Dorsal view; (b) ventral view; (c) lateral view; (d) mouth part (not to scale).
FIGURE 1 in The tadpole of Hypsiboas guentheri (Boulenger) (Anura: Hylidae)
FIGURE 1. Preserved tadpole of Hypsiboas guentheri (Stage 38) (ZUFABC 001). (A) dorsal view, (B) lateral view, (C) ventral view, (D) oral disc.
Fig. 3 in Identification and morphological description of tadpoles of the horned frog (Amphibia: Anura: Megophryidae) Pelobatrachus stejenegeri from the southern Philippines
Fig. 3. Dorsal view of live (A) and preserved (B) tadpole of Pelobatrachus stejnegeri showing its oral disc. Scale bar = 15 mm.
Fig. 6 in Identification and morphological description of tadpoles of the horned frog (Amphibia: Anura: Megophryidae) Pelobatrachus stejenegeri from the southern Philippines
Fig. 6. Preserved tadpole of Pelobatrachus stejnegeri. A, dorsal view; B, ventral view; C, lateral view. Scale bar = 12 mm.
Fig. 7 in Identification and morphological description of tadpoles of the horned frog (Amphibia: Anura: Megophryidae) Pelobatrachus stejenegeri from the southern Philippines
Fig. 7. Tadpole of Pelobatrachus stejnegeri observed at night attaching to wood debris in its habitat.
Fig. 5 in Identification and morphological description of tadpoles of the horned frog (Amphibia: Anura: Megophryidae) Pelobatrachus stejenegeri from the southern Philippines
Fig. 5. Live tadpole of Pelobatrachus stejnegeri. A, dorsal view; B, ventral view; C, lateral view. Scale bar = 12 mm.
Data from: Abiotic and biotic drivers on tadpoles in seasonal rock pools of Western Ghats rock outcrops, India
<p>We assessed the influence of abiotic (pool size, monsoon progression) and biotic (predator abundances) factors on occurrence and abundance of three species of tadpoles by periodically monitoring rock pools in lateritic plateaus. The dataset generated from this study is published here. </p> <p>Species Coverage: <em>Euphlyctis jaladhara, Microhyla nilphamariensis, Polypedates maculatus</em>; four predator groups (Pisaurid Spiders, Crabs, Water Beetles, Dragonfly Larvae)</p> <p>Geographic Coverage: Devi Hasol plateu of Ratnagiri District, Maharashtra State, India. (16°44'–16°45'N; 73°25–73°27'E)</p> <p>Temporal Coverage: July, August, September (2022).</p> <p> </p> <p><strong>Methods:</strong></p> <p>Nighttime rock pool surveys were conducted for tadpoles of three species (<em>Euphlyctis jaladhara, Microhyla nilphamariensis, Polypedates maculatus</em>). Pools were monitored eight times during the study period between 1900–2300 hr, usually in clear weather, barring occasional rain incidences. The pool water was clear during all the observation occasions. For large (>1003 cm<sup>3</sup>) pools, the observer gently walked along the bank and scanned the pool to record all animals. Care was taken not to recount the same schools of tadpoles, and a red light was used while approaching the pool to avoid light disturbance. The observer enumerated tadpoles of the three species and their potential predators (fishing spiders, crabs, dragonfly larvae, and water beetles) by counting them using head and hand-held torch lights. Following microhabitat variables were recorded at four occasions: Pool maximum length and width (cm), water depth (cm) at three points, humus cover (%), submerged vegetation cover (%), and edge vegetation cover (%). The percentage covers of vegetation and humus were visually estimated. </p> <p> </p> <p><strong>Funding:</strong></p> <ol> <li>On the Edge (UK)</li> <li>The Habitats Trust (India)</li> <li>The Bombay Environmental Action Group (India)</li> </ol>
Tadpoles rely on mechanosensory stimuli for communication when visual capabilities are poor
<p>The ways in which animals sense the world changes throughout development. For example, young of many species have limited visual capabilities, but still make social decisions, likely based on information gathered through other sensory modalities. Poison frog tadpoles display complex social behaviors that have been suggested to rely on vision despite a century of research indicating tadpoles have poorly-developed visual systems relative to adults. Alternatively, other sensory modalities, such as the lateral line system, are functional at hatching in frogs and may guide social decisions while other sensory systems mature. Here, we examined development of the mechanosensory lateral line and visual systems in tadpoles of the mimic poison frog (<em>Ranitomeya imitator)</em> that use vibrational begging displays to stimulate egg feeding from their mothers. <em>We found that tadpoles hatch with a fully developed lateral line system. While begging behavior increases with development, ablating the lateral line system inhibited begging in pre-metamorphic tadpoles, but not in metamorphic tadpoles.</em> We also found that the increase in begging and decrease in reliance on the lateral line co-occurs with increased retinal neural activity and gene expression associated with eye development. Using the neural tracer neurobiotin, we found that axonal innervations from the eye to the brain proliferate during metamorphosis, with little retinotectal connections in recently-hatched tadpoles. We then tested visual function in a phototaxis assay and found tadpoles prefer darker environments. The strength of this preference increased with developmental stage, but eyes were not required for this behavior, possibly indicating a role for the pineal gland. Together, these data suggest that tadpoles rely on different sensory modalities for social interactions across development and that the development of sensory systems in socially complex poison frog tadpoles is similar to that of other frog species.</p>
Fig. 13 in A New Trichodina Species (Peritrichia: Mobilida) from Anuran Tadpole Hosts, Sclerophrys spp. in the Okavango Panhandle, Botswana, with Comments on this Taxon
Fig. 13. Unrooted Maximum-likelihood (ML) consensus tree inferred from 18S SSU rDNA sequences illustrating the phylogenetic position of Trichodina koloti sp. nov. (at the top of the tree in bold), derived from 2551 nucleotide positions. Support values at the nodes are for bootstrap values/Bayesian posterior probabilities (ML/BI). Synonyms for both T. koloti and T. hypsilepis Wellborn, 1967 are indicated in brackets.
Figs 12a–f in A New Trichodina Species (Peritrichia: Mobilida) from Anuran Tadpole Hosts, Sclerophrys spp. in the Okavango Panhandle, Botswana, with Comments on this Taxon
Figs 12a–f. Denticle dimensions, as proposed by van As and Basson (1989; 1992), of Trichodina hypsilepis Wellborn, 1967 (syn. T. heterodentata) as recorded by and redrawn from: a – Population A of Duncan (1977), b – Population B of Duncan (1977), c – from van As and Basson (1989), d – from Tang and Zhao (2007), e – from Pádua et al. (2012), f – from Valladão et al. (2013).
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