Nesting habitat would not affect the structure of the eggshells of Caiman latirostris (Crocodylia, Alligatoridae)

FERNÁNDEZ,M; DI ROSSI, C; FRUTOS, ANTONIO E.; SIMONCINI, M S

La PLata

Congreso; XIX Congreso Argentino de Herpetología; 2018

Asociación Herpetológica Argentina (AHA)

In Santa Fe province, Broad-snouted caiman nest inthree different habitats: forest, savanna and floating vegetation. In thisstudy we compared eggshell characteristic (thickness, ornamentation, poresdensity and pores diameter) in eggs that complete incubation period by nests inthe wild. The aim of this research wasto evaluate if at the end of the incubation period, the eggshells suffer a differentialdegradation of the eggshell as a result of different condition of the nesting habitats. We collected 37 nests at the end of their incubation period or previous to offspringhatch, during late February and March 2016 (12 nests), and 2017 (25 nests). Weanalyze our data with General Linear Model Mix, taking into account thepredictive variable to the incubation environment, the random variable was thenest of origin of the eggshells and the response variables are the followings: thickness,ornamentation, pores density and pores diameter. We did not find differencesbetween each habitat in neither of the variables under study (P>0.07). Theprincipal result of this research involves the fact that, the eggsindependently of the habitat in which they were incubated will suffer the same structuralchange; the differences find were between nests but independently of thehabitats from which they belong. In future studies we will evaluate the changesin the microstructure of the eggshell from the beginning of the period of incubationto the end, with the objective to observe the process which may occur on theeggshell in the complete period of incubation.