Topic
Scathophagidae
About: Scathophagidae is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 157 publications have been published within this topic receiving 2529 citations.
Papers published on a yearly basis
Papers
TL;DR: This study investigated phenotypic plasticity in growth, development, body size, and diapause in the yellow dung fly, Scathophaga stercoraria, finding flexible growth rates are facilitated by low genetic correlations between development time and body size and selection for plasticity.
Abstract: Life-history theory predicts that age and size at maturity of organisms should be influenced by time and food constraints on development. This study investigated phenotypic plasticity in growth, development, body size, and diapause in the yellow dung fly, Scathophaga stercoraria. Full-sib families were allowed to develop under predator- free field conditions. The time before the onset of winter was varied and each brood was split into three environments differing in the amount of dung a set number of larvae had as a resource. When resources were abundant and competition was minimal, individuals of both sexes grew to larger body sizes, took longer time to mature, and were able to increase their growth rates to attain large body sizes despite shorter effective development periods later in the season. In contrast, limited larval resources and strong competition constrained individuals to mature earlier at a smaller adult size, and growth rates could not be increased but were at least maintained. This outcome is predicted by only two life-history optimality models, which treat mortality due to long development periods and mortality due to fast growth as independent. Elevated preadult mortality indicated physiological costs of fast growth independent of predation. When larval resources were limited, mortality increased with heritable variation in development time for males, and toward the end of the season mortality increased as larval resources became more abundant because this induced longer development periods. Sexual and fecundity selection favoring large body size in this species is thus opposed by larval viability selection favoring slower growth in general and shorter development periods when time and resources are limited; this overall combination of selective pressures is presumably shaping the reaction norms obtained here. Flexible growth rates are facilitated by low genetic correlations between development time and body size, a possible consequence of selection for plasticity. Heritable variation was evident in all traits investigated, as well as in phenotypic plasticity of these traits (genotype X interactions). This is possibly maintained by unpredictable spatiotemporal variation in dung abundance, competition, and hence selection.
250 citations
TL;DR: In this article, it was shown that females use both cues correlated with single locus variation (at the locus for the enzyme phosphoglucomutase, PGM) and quantitative trait variation (in body size and development time) to fertilize their eggs.
Abstract: Cryptic, or post-copulatory, female choice could markedly affect the outcome of sperm competition, i.e. a female could differentially manipulate ejaculates within her own body, affecting the fertilization successes of her mating partners. Female yellow dung flies, Scathophaga (Scatophaga) stercoraria, have three spermathecae, the sperm-storage organs, and can to some extent store the sperm of different males in different places. I show that a female's body size, as well as those of her mates, influences the process of sperm storage. Furthermore, females lay eggs of different genotypes under different environmental conditions. Females use both cues correlated with single locus variation (at the locus for the enzyme phosphoglucomutase, PGM) and quantitative trait variation (in body size and development time) when using sperm to fertilize their eggs. It is proposed that this allows a female to match the genotypes of her offspring to the conditions in which the larvae must grow, thus increasing their subsequent fitness. I describe an experiment where larvae of different PGM genotypes were raised in different environments and the most successful genotype was different in different environments. The complexity of the female reproductive sysrem may therefore have evolved because rhe best father for a female's offspring, from the female's viewpoint, is different under different environmental conditions. The effect interacts with the established male-determined effects to influence the outcome of sperm competition.
117 citations
TL;DR: The shrinkage of the testes of males collected throughout a day suggests that males copulate with an average of 4 females per day, and the costs of sperm production are shown to have a significant influence on the copula duration.
Abstract: Seasonal variation in mean hind tibia length and mean testes length is investigated in the yellow dung fly, Scathophaga stercoraria (L.). There is a cycle in mean hind tibia length and mean testes length over a season. The body size curve peaks later than the testes length curve, showing that there is no fixed relationship between the two variables. The causes of variation in testes size and its influence on copula duration are experimentally examined. Increasing the number of Drosophila eaten per day leads to increased mature testes length. Males with larger testes copulate for longer than males with smaller ones, and smaller males copulate for longer than do larger males. While testes shrivel with successive copulas, copula duration remains constant. The more females a male is prepared to copulate with in a day (up to five), the longer he copulates with each. The shrinkage of the testes of males collected throughout a day suggests that males copulate with an average of 4 females per day. The costs of sperm production are thus shown to have a significant influence on the copula duration.
116 citations
TL;DR: Scatophaga stereoraria L.calypterates is the common yellow dung fly found around droppings throughout the northern hemisphere and occurring as far south as North and South Africa and the Canary Islands.
Abstract: calypterates as being closely related to the Muscidae. The family includes species of very varied habits; Scatophaga stereoraria L. ( = Scopeuma stercorarium) is the common yellow dung fly found around droppings throughout the northern hemisphere and occurring as far south as North and South Africa and the Canary Islands. Despite its ubiquity, Scatophaga stercoraria has attracted only cursory investigation with the exception of the works of Cotterell (1920) and Hammer (1941). From Hammer's excellent monograph, the reproductive biology of the species may be summarized as follows. The males arrive first around the fresh droppings, often in considerable numbers. As the females arrive, they are immediately grasped by the nearest male. After copulation, the male remains mounted above the female during oviposition, though he retains contact with the female only by means of the grasp of his front tarsi around the junction between her thorax and abdomen. At this time the genitalia are quite free and the middle and hind legs of the male rest on the surface of the dung. During the time that the male is paired to the female, fierce struggles may arise should second males attempt to gain possession of the female. The eggs are laid in a single dropping and the larvae hatch out on to the dung surface, into which they burrow immediately. Pupation takes place either in the crust of the dropping or in the soil beneath, and the adults emerge some 3-4 weeks after oviposition. The females emerge about a day before the males (Lewis & Bletchly
116 citations
TL;DR: The monophyly of three of the four recognized families in the Muscoidea is confirmed: the Fanniidae, Muscidae, and Scathophagidae, however, the Anthomyiidae are possibly paraphyletic.
106 citations
Related Topics (5)
Performance Metrics
| Year | Papers |
|---|---|
| 2021 | 4 |
| 2020 | 4 |
| 2019 | 7 |
| 2018 | 8 |
| 2017 | 6 |
| 2016 | 4 |