Felicity Anne Huntingford - Böcker

This volume is based on the proceedings of a conference held in Sicily, in October 1991. It illustrates the developments in the field of behavioural ecology using fishes, with new or more sophisticated ideas and techniques that offer the potential of powerful analyses of selection on behaviour.

This comprehensive textbook discusses the study of animal behaviour, its origins in classical ethology and its current status. Factors determining the course and eventual outcome of the development of behaviour are investigated. The adaptive significance of behavioural traits such as habitat selection, foraging patterns, group living and territorial and mating behaviour is examined. In the analysis of behavioural change, consideration is given to the theory and application of motivational models and the interface between physiological and behavioural research. Topics discussed include the evolution of co-operation and altruism, the strengths and weaknesses of the sociobiological approach, behavioural genetics, practical applications of ethology and the general influence of animal behaviour on the course of evolution.

Highlighting the growing importance of the sticklebacks as a model species in emerging fields such as molecular genetics, genomics, and environmental toxicology, Biology of the Three-Spined Stickleback examines data from researchers who use studies of the stickleback to address a wide range of biological issues. This state-of-the-art volume is the first comprehensive review of the biological research on this important fish in more than a decade.The book presents current knowledge on the geographic and genetic variation of the ubiquitous three-spined stickleback and explores the possibility of any subdivision within currently recognized stickleback species. It provides a summary of important new molecular tools available, and how these tools can be used to study the genetic architecture and molecular basis of evolutionary change in different stickleback populations around the world. The book also lays out their physiology, historical factors, geographic distribution, and describes the features of their biology that seem to promote rapid speciation. It covers reproductive behavior in chronological order, and the mechanisms and selection pressures behind the activities that sticklebacks perform during the different phases of the breeding season. Full of cutting-edge data, the book discusses the umwelt of the three-spine stickleback, with particular reference to how that world interacts with and shapes intraspecific communication during the breeding season. It covers developments in stickleback reproductive physiology from 1991 onward and summarizes studies performed — mainly within the fields of behavioral ecology and physiology — on some of the less-studied stickleback species. The book touches on the biology, in particular the behavioral ecology, of the 15-spined stickleback. Emphasizing the importance of the sticklebacks to a variety of disciplines, this book presents information that is both extensive and authoritative.