Moving to the city: testing the implications of morphological shifts on locomotor performance in introduced urban lizards

Abstract

Abstract Understanding how morphology affects performance in novel environments and how populations shift their morphology in response to environmental selective pressures is necessary to understand how invaders can be successful. We tested these relationships in a global colonizer, the common wall lizard (Podarcis muralis), translocated to Cincinnati, OH, USA 70 years ago. We investigated how morphology shifts in this population inhabiting a novel environment, how these morphological shifts influence locomotor performance and how performance changes in novel conditions. We compared the morphology of museum specimens and current lizards to see which aspects of morphology have shifted over time. Although overall body size did not change, most body dimensions reduced in size. We measured sprint speed with a full-factorial design of substrate type, incline angle and obstacles. We identified a pattern of negative correlation in sprint performance between conditions with and without obstacles. The locomotor advantage of larger body size was diminished when obstacles were present. Finally, there was no relationship between individual variation in contemporary morphology and sprint performance, providing no support to the hypothesis that these shifts are attributable to selective pressures on locomotor performance in the conditions tested.