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Competitive dominance and broad environmental tolerance favour invasive success of Nile tilapia

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Abstract

Invasive species cause substantial changes to the biodiversity of freshwater systems. The African Nile tilapia (Oreochromis niloticus) is now widely distributed in tropical freshwaters globally. Despite indications that feral populations can influence native species through competitive effects, direct evidence of competition between Nile tilapia and native species is rare. Moreover, it is not clear if environmental variables such as temperature and oxygen concentration modulate competition. Here, interactions between Nile tilapia and the native Mayan cichlid (Mayaheros urophthalmus) were studied in experimental mesocosms in south-eastern Mexico. We found that Nile tilapia was the more active and aggressive of the two species, and their movement was only weakly influenced by temperature and oxygen concentration. By contrast, movement of the Mayan cichlid was strongly predicted by the movement and aggression of Nile tilapia, and the Mayan cichlid showed a steep decline in behaviours with increased water temperature and reduced oxygen. Our results suggest that broad environmental tolerance of the intrinsically aggressive Nile tilapia provides it with an advantage over native species. Collectively these traits may help to exacerbate its invasive success as those environmental conditions become more commonplace in a changing world.

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Data availability

https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.5569202.

Code availability

https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.5569202.

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Acknowledgements

We thank Karlos Velazques for his support during the experimental trials. We are grateful to S. Mariani, M. Yallop, anonymous reviewers and the editors for useful comments.

Funding

CONACYT (Consejo Nacional de Ciencia y Tecnología) Studentship to CAGJ.

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CAGJ, CCI and MJG designed the experiment, CAGJ conducted the experiment and collected the data, CAGJ and MJG analysed the data, CAGJ and MJG wrote the first draft paper, CAGJ, CCI and MJG worked on subsequent drafts.

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Correspondence to Carlos A. Gracida-Juárez.

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The experimental work was approved by the Animal Welfare and Ethics Review Board of the University of Bristol (UIN Code UB/17/055).

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Handling editor: Fernando M. Pelicice

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Gracida-Juárez, C.A., Ioannou, C.C. & Genner, M.J. Competitive dominance and broad environmental tolerance favour invasive success of Nile tilapia. Hydrobiologia 849, 1161–1176 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10750-021-04778-5

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