Data from: Life histories as mosaics: plastic and genetic components differ among traits that underpin life-history strategies

Life-history phenotypes emerge from clusters of traits that are the
product of genes and phenotypic plasticity. If the impact of the
environment differs substantially between traits, then life histories
might not evolve as a cohesive whole. We quantified the sensitivity of
components of the life history to food availability, a key environmental
difference in the habitat occupied by contrasting ecotypes, for 36 traits
in fast-and slow-reproducing Trinidadian guppies. Our dataset included six
putatively independent origins of the slow-reproducing, derived ecotype.
Traits varied substantially in plastic and genetic control. Twelve traits
were influenced only by food availability (body lengths, body weights),
five only by genetic differentiation (inter-birth intervals, offspring
sizes), ten by both (litter sizes, reproductive timing), and nine by
neither (fat contents, reproductive allotment). Ecotype-by-food
interactions were negligible. The response to low food was aligned with
the genetic difference between high- and low-food environments, suggesting
that plasticity was adaptive. The heterogeneity among traits in
environmental sensitivity and genetic differentiation reveals that the
components of the life history may not evolve in concert. Ecotypes may
instead represent mosaics of trait groups that differ in their rate of
evolution.