Data from: Take this broken tail and learn to jump: the ability to recover from reduced in-air stability in tailless green anole lizards (Anolis carolinensis [Squamata: Dactyloidae])

Locomotion is involved in various fitness related tasks, such as foraging, acquiring mates and escaping from predators. Despite the importance of locomotor performance in determining fitness, animals often encounter situations in nature during which their locomotor performance is severely compromised. For animals that actively discard appendages as an antipredator strategy, the loss of appendages can cause a severe reduction in locomotor performance. However, whether animals can compensate for the impact on locomotor performance after autotomy is still unclear. A previous study has shown that tailless green anole lizards suffered from reduced in-air stability during jumping. In this study, we monitored jump kinematics in three groups of Anolis carolinensis for five consecutive weeks to test two hypotheses. First, whether tailless green anoles can recover from reduced in-air stability before their tails can regenerate. Second, whether gaining locomotor experience facilitates locomotor recovery. Our results revealed extensive individual variation in the ability to compensate for reduced in-air stability. Some individuals did improve in-air stability during the study period, whereas others showed no sign of improvement. Moreover, the acquisition of locomotor experience did not facilitate the recovery process. Our findings suggested that tail autotomy in green anoles likely imposes a long-term fitness disadvantage. The utility of other compensatory mechanisms, such as altering behavior, might play a role in natural populations to minimize the impact of autotomy on individual fitness. Our findings also shed some light on the independent evolutionary losses of the ability to autotomize within lizards. Comparative studies which test whether species that autotomize more frequently/easily can better compensate for the effect of autotomy would be a fruitful direction of future research.

运动能力参与诸多与个体适合度（fitness）相关的生命活动，例如觅食、求偶与躲避捕食者。尽管运动表现对个体适合度的决定作用举足轻重，但动物在自然环境中常面临运动能力严重受损的情境。对于主动舍弃附肢作为反捕食策略的动物而言，附肢缺失会显著降低其运动表现。然而，动物在自割（autotomy）后能否弥补运动能力所受的负面影响，目前尚无定论。已有研究显示，去尾的绿安乐蜥（Anolis carolinensis）在跳跃过程中空中稳定性会出现下降。本研究对三组绿安乐蜥开展了连续五周的跳跃运动学（jump kinematics）监测，以验证两项假说：其一，无尾绿安乐蜥能否在尾巴再生之前恢复受损的空中稳定性；其二，获得运动经验是否会促进运动能力的恢复。研究结果显示，个体在弥补空中稳定性下降的能力上存在广泛差异：部分个体在研究期间确实提升了空中稳定性，而另一些个体则未表现出任何恢复迹象。此外，运动经验的积累并未对恢复过程起到促进作用。本研究结果表明，绿安乐蜥的尾部自割可能会带来长期的适合度劣势。诸如行为调整等其他补偿机制，或许在自然种群中发挥着作用，以减轻自割对个体适合度的负面影响。本研究结果也为蜥蜴类动物自割能力的独立演化丢失提供了新的研究视角。未来可开展比较研究，验证自割行为更频繁、更容易发生的物种是否能更好地弥补自割带来的影响，这将是极具价值的研究方向。