The eco-evolutionary dynamics of Batesian mimicry

Abstract

Batesian mimicry is a strategy in which palatable prey species (mimic-species) resemble unpalatable prey species with aposematism (model-species). Theoretical studies on Batesian mimicry have been conducted in terms of their evolutionary significance and ecological consequences. However, despite the importance of eco-evolutionary feedback, the evolution and population dynamics of mimicry complex have long been explored separately. Previous studies on the dynamics of mimicry complex have proposed the possibility of the extinction of unpalatable species due to high predation by predators confusing palatable and unpalatable species. If the abundance of palatable species was large in comparison with unpalatable species, predation pressure on both unpalatable and palatable species became severe, resulting in the extinction of the unpalatable species. We hypothesized that palatable species evolved not to be similar to unpalatable species when unpalatable species became rare, because this situation is no longer advantageous for palatable species to mimic unpalatable species. Here, we constructed the eco-evolutionary dynamics of unpalatable and palatable species, and demonstrated that the evolutionary process of palatable species, which has been overlooked in previous theoretical studies, could rescue the unpalatable species from extinction. We modeled predators’ foraging decisions based on signal detection theory. We assumed that palatable species evolve in a trait space, in which there are separate adaptive peaks on either side of an adaptive valley for mimicry and cryptic phenotypes. Then, we derived the stability conditions of the equilibria. As a result, the evolution of a cryptic phenotype in palatable species was driven when unpalatable species was rare, which mitigated predation pressure on unpalatable species through the reduction in the probability to be attacked. This could work to rescue unpalatable species from extinction.