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American Zoologist 1994 34(3):323-332; doi:10.1093/icb/34.3.323
© 1994 by The Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology
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Control and Consequences of Alternative Developmental Modes in a Poecilogonous Polychaete1

LISA A. LEVIN and TODD S. BRIDGES
Marine Life Research Group, Scripps Institution of Oceanograph La Jolla, California 92093-0218
Department of Marine, Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, North Carolina State University Raleigh, North Carolina 29695-8208

SYNOPSIS. The poecilogonous polychaete Streblospio benedicti (Webster) exhibits both planktotrophic and lecithotrophic modes of larval development. The alternative trophic modes are associated with differences in age and size at maturation, offspring number, size and energetic investment, larval planktonic period, morphology and survivorship. This paper reviews a decade of research into the control and consequences of the traits associated with planktotrophy and lecithotrophy in S. benedicti. The dominant control on reproductive and developmental characters is genetic. Significant additive genetic variance has been detected for egg diameter, fecundity, larval planktonic period and aspects of larval morphology. However, environmental factors such as temperature, food quality and photoperiod, and intrinsic factors such as maternal age, exert considerable influence on non-trophic developmental traits (e.g., offspring number, size and energy content). Demographic consequences of development mode are reviewed for field and laboratory demes of S. benedicti dominated by individuals exhibiting either planktotrophy or lecithotrophy. Similar population size structure, fluctuations in abundance, P: B ratios, and estimated population growth rates are achieved through trade-offs between survivorship and fecundity.

Development mode may best be viewed as a complex set of traits that are intimately linked developmentally and evolutionarily to other aspects of an organism's life history. Greater insight into the control and consequences of development mode should result from further investigation of these linkages


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