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Do These Crayfish Make Me Look Fat? Body Condition Correlates To Prey Abundance In Three Hellbender (Cryptobranchus Alleganiensis) Populations

View ORCID ProfileKirsten Hecht, Max Nickerson, View ORCID ProfileMichael Freake, Phil Colclough, Katie Stofer
doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/659441
Kirsten Hecht
1School of Natural Resources and Environment, University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida, USA 32611
2Florida Museum of Natural History, University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida, USA 32611
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  • For correspondence: kirstenhecht@ufl.edu
Max Nickerson
1School of Natural Resources and Environment, University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida, USA 32611
2Florida Museum of Natural History, University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida, USA 32611
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Michael Freake
3Department of Natural Sciences and Mathematics, Lee University, Cleveland, Tennessee, USA 37320
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Phil Colclough
4Knoxville Zoological Gardens, 3500 Knoxville Zoo Drive, Knoxville, Tennessee, USA 37914
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Katie Stofer
5Department of Agricultural Education and Communication, University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida, USA 32611
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Abstract

In ecological studies body condition is often measured as an indicator of animal health or well-being. The Hellbender (Cryptobranchus alleganiensis) is a threatened salamander species found throughout the montane regions of the eastern United States. Although few young individuals have historically been found in the wild, recent studies in Blue Ridge Physiographic Regions have uncovered larvae in several streams. In Little River, Tennessee, differences in the crayfish population, the principal component of the adult Hellbender diet, was hypothesized as a potential reason for the large number of immature individuals, and lack of large adults. To investigate this hypothesis, we compared body condition of Hellbenders in three streams with different crayfish relative frequencies. Body condition of Hellbenders was positively correlated with crayfish relative frequencies, with Hellbenders in the stream with the highest crayfish relative frequency exhibiting the highest expected mass per total length.

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The copyright holder for this preprint is the author/funder, who has granted bioRxiv a license to display the preprint in perpetuity. It is made available under a CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0 International license.
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Posted June 04, 2019.
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Do These Crayfish Make Me Look Fat? Body Condition Correlates To Prey Abundance In Three Hellbender (Cryptobranchus Alleganiensis) Populations
Kirsten Hecht, Max Nickerson, Michael Freake, Phil Colclough, Katie Stofer
bioRxiv 659441; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/659441
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Do These Crayfish Make Me Look Fat? Body Condition Correlates To Prey Abundance In Three Hellbender (Cryptobranchus Alleganiensis) Populations
Kirsten Hecht, Max Nickerson, Michael Freake, Phil Colclough, Katie Stofer
bioRxiv 659441; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/659441

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