Data from: Parental and embryonic experiences with predation risk affect prey offspring behavior and performance

Because phenotypic plasticity can operate both within and between generations, phenotypic outcomes are often shaped by a complex history of environmental signals. For example, parental and embryonic experiences with predation risk can both independently and interactively influence prey offspring traits early in their life. Parental and embryonic risk experiences can also independently shape offspring phenotypes throughout an offspring's ontogeny, but the persistence of their interactive effects throughout offspring ontogeny is unknown. We examined the effects of parental and embryonic experiences with predation risk on the response of one-year-old prey (the carnivorous snail, Nucella lapillus) offspring to current predation risk. We found that parental and embryonic risk experiences had largely independent effects on offspring performance and that these effects were context dependent. Parental experience with risk had strong impacts on multiple offspring traits in the presence of current risk that generally improved offspring performance under risk, but embryonic risk experience had relatively weaker effects and only operated in the absence of current risk to reduce offspring growth. These results illustrate that past environmental experiences can dynamically shape organism phenotypes across ontogeny and that attention to these effects is key to a better understanding of predator/prey dynamics in natural systems.1.donelan&trussell.behaviorData used in analysis of refuge use and to construct Fig. 1.2.donelan&trussell.avgforagingData used in analysis of foraging activity and to construct Fig. S1 in Electronic Supplementary Material.3.donelan&trussell.growth&GEData used in analyses of Nucella offspring growth and growth efficiency and to construct Figs. 2 and 3.4.donelan&trussell.musselsRaw data of mussels that were consumed by Nucella offspring during the experiment. Used to calculate total energy consumed by offspring in File 2 and per capita foraging activity and in Fig. S1 in Electronic Supplementary Material.4.donelan&trussell.rawmussels.csvFunding provided by: National Science FoundationCrossref Funder Registry ID: http://dx.doi.org/10.13039/100000001Award Number: OCE-0963010, OCE-145815