Latitudinal Variation And Mechanism Of The Femals Genus Takydromus In Response To Environmental Temperature Rise

Warming has significantly increased the extinction rate of many vertebrate groups,with reptiles at the forefront of the pack.Under the current climate warming,the response patterns of important life history characteristics,such as reproduction and survival,to climate warming directly determine the fate of a population or a species,and are crucial for assessing the extent to which a species is threatened by climate warming.Although some work has been done on the reproductive response of reptiles to global warming,the geographical patterns and physiological and biochemical mechanisms of the effects of global warming on reptile reproduction are still unclear.Under the background of environmental temperature rise caused by climate warming,reptiles may be able to avoid the effects of warming temperatures by regulating their behavior.It can also regulate physiological characteristics in response to climate warming through the regulation of various metabolic enzymes.Therefore,this paper focuses on the effects of ambient temperature on reproduction of female reptiles by taking the subtropical lizard Takydromus septentrionalis and the tropical lizard Takydromus kuehnei in mainland China as research objects,and focuses on the response of female lizards in different latitudes to the increase of ambient temperature in terms of behavior,physiology,and biochemical indicators.The results showed that the lizard species at different latitudes were unable to buffer the effect of ambient temperature rise on body temperature through thermal regulation.Increasing ambient temperature would decrease the selection temperature,optimal temperature and resting metabolic rate of the mother lizard at the time of egg conception.Finally,the average egg weight,an important reproductive index,was significantly increased under the background of ambient temperature increase.In lowlatitude female lizard,the effect of ambient temperature increase was only reflected in the physiological phenomenon that the optimal temperature of female lizard was lowered when she conceived eggs,but not in other aspects.It was found that the reproductive output of the lizard was not significantly affected by climate warming.This study reveals that,compared with the tropics,the northern grassland lizard species in the middle and subtropical latitudes can respond to the temperature rise caused by climate warming through a variety of behavioral and physiological ways,thereby regulating its energy state and ultimately improving its reproductive output.The prediction is that the northernmost lizards in the subtropics are less threatened by global warming than their tropical counterparts.Moreover,moderate warming in the future may promote the population regulation of the lizard.