Parental and individual experience with predation risk interact in shaping phenotypes in a sex-specific manner

Abstract

Evolutionary history, parental experience and individual experience provide distinct avenues by which the environment alters phenotypes, yet the mechanisms mediating phenotypic variation on these timescales may interact. Here we examine how parental environment and juvenile experience jointly modify offspring phenotypes in the Trinidadian guppy, Poecilia reticulata . Parents were reared in the laboratory either with or without predator cues, and offspring were split and reared either with or without predator cues. We found that parental effects led to smaller body size, an increase in whole-body cortisol and increases in activity and antipredator behaviour in open field and model predator assays. For most traits, both individual and parental experience with predators produced similar outcomes. For some traits, male and female offspring differed in consequences of parental and individual exposure to predator cues. Together, our results suggest that parental effects and offspring experience influence males and females differently, last into adulthood and highlight the complex interactions between intergenerational and developmental plasticity. • Organisms receive information from parents and individual experience. • Trinidadian guppies were exposed to parental and individual predator cues. • Offspring differed in morphological, physiological and behavioural responses. • Male and female offspring phenotypes differed. • Parental and offspring experience interact differently in males and females.