Journal
ECOLOGY AND EVOLUTION
Volume 11, Issue 14, Pages 9589-9598Publisher
WILEY
DOI: 10.1002/ece3.7779
Keywords
amphibians; Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis; chytrid; chytridiomycosis; Hyla versicolor; Lithobates palustris
Categories
Funding
- Indiana Academy of Sciences
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Exposure to the virulent fungal pathogen Bd was found to increase the CTmin for frogs and decrease their righting response, with Hyla versicolor showing a higher CTmin than Lithobates palustris. This reduced cold tolerance in Bd-exposed frogs may lead to increased overwintering mortality.
The ability of an organism to tolerate seasonal temperature changes, such as extremely cold temperatures during the winter, can be influenced by their pathogens. We tested how exposure to a virulent fungal pathogen, Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis (Bd), affected the critical thermal minimum (CTmin) of two frog species, Hyla versicolor (gray treefrog) and Lithobates palustris (pickerel frog). The CTmin is the minimum thermal performance point of an organism, which we estimated via righting response trials. For both frog species, we compared the righting response of Bd-exposed and Bd-unexposed individuals in either a constant (15oC) environment or with decreasing temperatures (-1 degrees C/2.5 min) starting from 15 degrees C. The CTmin for both species was higher for Bd-exposed frogs than unexposed frogs, and the CTmin of H. versicolor was higher than L. palustris. We also found that Bd-exposed frogs of both species righted themselves significantly fewer times in both decreasing and constant temperature trials. Our findings show that pathogen exposure can reduce cold tolerance and limit the thermal performance range of hosts, which may lead to increased overwintering mortality.
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