During conflicts, animals may perform displays that convey information about their future antagonistic behavior. Although theory once predicted that such signals of "intent" would be utterly susceptible to dishonesty, empirical studies have established that animals sometimes do signal their intentions. It remains unclear, however, what level of honesty exists within such signals. Here I report ...

Organisms can receive not only a genetic inheritance from their ancestors but also an ecological inheritance, involving modifications their ancestors made to the environment through niche construction. Ecological inheritances may persist as a legacy, potentially generating selection pressures that favor sociality. Yet, most proposed cases of sociality being impacted by an ecological inheritance...

The standard approach in accounting for hierarchical differentiation in biology and the social sciences considers a hierarchy as a static distribution of individuals possessing differing amounts of some valued commodity, assumes that the hierarchy is generated by micro-level processes involving individuals, and attempts to reverse engineer the processes that produced the hierarchy. However, suf...

The complete larval development of Pagurus lanuginosus is described and illustrated including the first description of the post-larval stage. Specimens were reared in the laboratory at 15°C and 33.5-35.02 PSU. Newly hatched larvae passed through a short prezoeal stage (10 minutes to 2 hours), four zoeal stages (6, 6, 6, 8 days), and one megalopal stage (10 days). We compared the morphological f...

The tropical intertidal hermit crabs Clibanarius taeniatus and Clibanarius virescens were examined for differences in survival and physiological responses in low salinity. We found that C. taeniatus survived better in dilute seawater than C. virescens and that these species did not differ in their abilities to regulate haemolymph osmolarity, ionic concentration of the haemolymph or body fluid v...

The lithodid crab Paralomis spinosissima is previously known only in Sub-Antarctic waters from South Georgia Island to the Drake Passage. Here we recorded a juvenile male obtained off shores of Mar del Plata (~37°S), Argentina. This new occurrence extends the distribution range of the species over 1300 km northwards in the Atlantic Ocean.

Decapod community inhabiting the rocky littoral of eight bays from Socorro island, Revillagigedo Archipelago, was studied during March 1992. Samples were collected from one-square meter plots placed following transects drawn perpendicularly to the shoreline along the intertidal zone. Species richness and abundance were determined in each bay, as well as the similarity between bays using Morisit...

Two new species of Munidopsis are described from the wider New Zealand region. Munidopsis bamberi sp. nov. is described from the Havre Trough adjacent to the Kermadec Volcanic Arc north-east of the New Zealand continental shelf, and is named in honour of Roger Bamber for his contributions to arthropod taxonomy and systematics. The second species is M. sculpo sp. nov. from Forde Seamount on the ...

Zoeal stages of the hermit crab Labidochirus anomalus (Balss, 1913) (Decapoda: Anomura: Paguridae) are described and illustrated from the larvae reared in the laboratory. The development included four zoeal stages following the typical pattern in the Paguridae. Morphological features of the larvae of L. anomalus are compared with those described for the related species L. splendescens (Owen, 18...

Climate is a strong driver of global diversity and will become increasingly important as human influences drive temperature changes at unprecedented rates. Here we investigate diversification and speciation trends within a diverse group of aquatic crustaceans, the Anomura. We use a phylogenetic framework to demonstrate that speciation rate is correlated with global cooling across the entire tre...