The Effects of Egg-incubation Temperature on Growth and Survival of Hatchling Painted Turtles

The environmental conditions that reptile embryos experience during development have profound effects on many offspring traits. For example, incubation temperature affects offspring body size, growth rate, running performance, and even gender—all phenotypic traits that are important for survival and reproduction (i.e., fitness). Although these effects on fitness-related traits are well known, very few studies have evaluated the long-term consequences of incubation temperature on survival and reproduction, particularly in long-lived species