Abstract
Drosophila melanogasteradults were employed in single resource patches of varying density and size and in a multiple-patch array to determine the degree to which resource dispersion influences searching success. Individuals from rover and sitter selected lines, with extreme genotypes for local search duration, are not as successful as control-line (wild-type) flies in locating sucrose drops in single patches varying in size and density. The number of new drops located differed significantly between fly lines in all patch types, except in a high-density patch, and within each fly line over the different patch sizes and densities. The similarities in number of drops found by rovers and sitters in all patch types are not reflected in the time periods spent searching. In the multiple-patch array sitters never left the central patch, whereas most rovers and con-trol-line flies found additional patches. The proximate explanations for the success or failure of the three fly lines in different patch sizes and densities relate to the looping locomotor pattern characterizing local search in D. melanogaster.The reactivation of searching each time a drop is ingested or revisited keeps an individual in the immediate vicinity of the last encountered resource. Flies from the selected lines, each exhibiting extreme types of locomotor patterns, leave patches relatively unexploited because local search consists either of rapid, nearly linear movement away from a drop in rovers or of relatively long bouts of local search in sitters, which promotes revisiting rather than locating new drops. Control-line flies locate more drops than either rovers or sitters and in less time than sitters, suggesting that their intermediate phenotype for search behavior allows for more flexibility in searching in various patch sizes and resource densities. The results are discussed with reference to environmental and physiological factors that may modify searching behavior and, possibly, enhance the survival of individuals with extreme genotypes.
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Tortorici, C., Bell, W.J. Search orientation in adultDrosophila melanogaster: Responses of rovers and sitters to resource dispersion in a food patch. J Insect Behav 1, 209–223 (1988). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01052239
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01052239