The temperament of animals can vary among individuals and among populations, but it is often unclear whether spatial variation in temperament is the result of acclimation to local environmental conditions or genetic adaptation to spatial differences in natural selection. This study tested whether populations of a marine fish that experience different levels of mortality and fishing exhibited local adaptation in behaviors related to predator avoidance and evasion. First, we measured variation in reactivity to perceived risk in wild populations of black surfperch (Embiotoca jacksoni). We compared flight initiation distances (FID) between populations with significantly different mortality rates. After finding that FID values were substantially lower in the low-risk locations, we tested for local adaptation by rearing lab-born offspring from both high- and low-risk populations in a common environment before measuring their behavior. Lab-reared offspring from high- and low-risk populations exhibited significant differences in several behaviors related to reactivity. Between 23 and 43% of the total variation in behaviors we measured could be attributed to source population. These results thus suggest that a substantial amount of spatial variation in behaviors related to predator evasion may represent local adaptation. In addition, behaviors we measured had an average, broad-sense heritability of 0.24, suggesting that the behavioral tendencies of these populations have some capacity to evolve further in response to any changes in selection.

动物的气质可能因个体和种群而异，但通常不清楚气质的空间变化是适应当地环境条件还是自然适应空间差异的遗传适应的结果。这项研究测试了死亡率和捕捞水平不同的海鱼种群在与避免和逃避捕食者有关的行为中是否表现出局部适应性。首先，我们测量了黑冲浪者（Embiotoca jacksoni）野生种群对感知风险的反应性变化）。我们比较了死亡率显着不同的人群之间的飞行起始距离（FID）。在发现低风险地区的FID值明显较低后，我们通过在共同的环境中从高风险和低风险人群中饲养实验室出生的后代来测试本地适应性，然后再测量其行为。在高风险和低风险人群中，实验室饲养的后代在与反应性相关的几种行为上表现出显着差异。在我们测量的行为总变化中，有23％至43％可以归因于来源人群。因此，这些结果表明，与捕食者逃避有关的行为中大量的空间变化可能表示局部适应。此外，我们测得的行为的广义广义遗传度为0.24，