Os padrões ecomorfológicos apresentados pelas espécies da ordem Characiformes (actinopterygii) são relacionadas com suas adaptações ecológicas?

Abstract

The morphological patterns shown in the species result from the interactions between their phenotype, genotype, and environment through adaptive and evolutionary processes. Thus, this study aims to evaluate the role of phylogeny and feeding in the morphological patterns of the species of Characiformes order, testing the hypothesis that the environmental pressure interferes in the morphological patterns presented by species causing morphological divergence or convergence between them. The site selected for this research was the pond Curralinho, an marginal pond of the Rio São Francisco, located in the state of Pernambuco. In this work we used the twelve species of the Order Characiformes more abundant in the ecosystem evaluated, which were captured in the period from March/2007 to February/2008 Through morphological data and diet analysis, we found that segregation of Characiformes in morphologically distinct groups, reflecting dietary differences. Therefore, morphologically similar species tending to occupy the same trophic guild. The piscivorous Acestrorhynchus britskii, Acestrorhynchus lacustris, Hoplias malabaricus, Serrasalmus brandtii and Pygocentrus piraya showed morphological characteristics that allowed ingest relatively large prey. However, we observed differences in the efficacy of swimming performance of these piscivorous, indicating that the piscivorous that eat whole fish exhibit greater agility swimming performance in order to capture your evasive preys that presented adaptations to avoid and escape the predators. The species Roeboides xenodon and Leporinus reinhardti also preferably used fish in their diets, however, the morphology of these species did not show any adjustments found in majority of the piscivorous. The less swimming speed was evidentiated among the members of the guilds insectivorous and omnivorous, that using food items with lower mobility than fish, like insects, or immobile, such as vegetables. This lower efficiency in swimming performance does not seem to characterize a disadvantage for these species. These appear to preferentially occupy the margin of the water body, which offers greater resource availability for these fish. The relationship between morphology and trophic ecology was confirmed by the Mantel test. This test indicated that the ecological structure of the taxocenosis evaluated probably been shaped by evolutionary adaptations for use of a given resource. These adaptations may be evident when we observe the processes of adaptive convergence and divergence.