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Aestivation (Latin: aestas (summer); also spelled estivation in American English) is a state of animal dormancy, similar to hibernation, although taking place in the summer rather than the winter. Aestivation is characterized by inactivity and a lowered metabolic rate, that is entered in response to high temperatures and arid conditions. [ 1 ]
Aestivation or estivation is the positional arrangement of the parts of a flower within a flower bud before it has opened. Aestivation is also sometimes referred to as praefoliation or prefoliation , but these terms may also mean vernation : the arrangement of leaves within a vegetative bud.
Many xerocoles, especially rodents, estivate in the summer, becoming more dormant. [5] Some desert amphibians estivate underground for over a year at a time. [10] Unlike hibernation, which leads to a state of torpor, estivation induces lethargy, and can go unnoticed in some animals if their body temperature is not measured. [13]
In many small species, food caching replaces eating and becoming fat. [4] Some species of mammals hibernate while gestating young, which are born either while the mother hibernates or shortly afterwards. [5] For example, female black bears go into hibernation during the winter months in order to give birth to their offspring. [6]
Pigeons intermingle with tourists in Venice. A synanthrope (from ancient Greek σύν sýn "together, with" and ἄνθρωπος ánthrōpos "man") is an organism that evolved to live near humans and benefit from human settlements and their environmental modifications (see also anthropophilia for animals who live close to humans as parasites).
Different animals will manage their circadian rhythm differently, and in some species it's seen to completely stop (such as in European hamsters). Other organisms, such as a black bear , enter torpor and switch to multi-day cycles rather than rely on a circadian rhythm.
Species go extinct constantly as environments change, as organisms compete for environmental niches, and as genetic mutation leads to the rise of new species from older ones. At long irregular intervals, Earth's biosphere suffers a catastrophic die-off, a mass extinction , [ 9 ] often comprising an accumulation of smaller extinction events over ...
Like in plants, microbial succession can occur in newly available habitats (primary succession) such as surfaces of plant leaves, recently exposed rock surfaces (i.e., glacial till) or animal infant guts, [29] and also on disturbed communities (secondary succession) like those growing in recently dead trees, decaying fruits, [39] or animal ...