There is no evidence that Podoctidae carry eggs of their own species: Reply to Machado and Wolff (2017)

0475526 - BC 2019 RIV US eng J - Journal Article
Sharma, P. P. - Oberski, J. T. - Santiago, M. A. - Kriebel, R. - Lipps, S. M. - Buenavente, P. A. C. - Diesmos, A. C. - Janda, Milan - Boyer, S. L. - Clouse, R. M. - Wheeler, W. C.
There is no evidence that Podoctidae carry eggs of their own species: Reply to Machado and Wolff (2017).
Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution. Roč. 129, DEC 01 (2018), s. 349-353. ISSN 1055-7903. E-ISSN 1095-9513
Institutional support: RVO:60077344
Keywords : egg attachment * opiliones * harvestman
OECD category: Zoology
Impact factor: 3.992, year: 2018
Method of publishing: Limited access
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1055790316304018?via%3Dihub

In our recent publication (Sharma et al., 2017), we tested the hypothesis that eggs attached to the legs of male Podoctidae (Opiliones, Laniatores) constituted a case of paternal care, using molecular sequence data in tandem with multiple sequence alignments to test the prediction that sequences of the eggs and the adults that carried them would indicate conspecific identity. We discovered that the sequences of the eggs belonged to spiders, and thus rejected the paternal care hypothesis for these species. Machado and Wolff (2017) recently critiqued our work, which they regarded as a non-critical interpretation and over-reliance on molecular sequence data, and defended the traditional argument that the eggs attached to podoctids are in fact harvestman eggs. Here we show that additional molecular sequence data also refute the identity of the eggs as conspecific harvestman eggs, using molecular cloning techniques to rule out contamination. We show that individual gene trees consistently and reliably place the egg and adult sequences in disparate parts of the tree topology. Phylogenetic methods consistently place all egg sequences within the order Araneae (spiders). We submit that evidence for the paternal care hypothesis based on behavioral, morphological, and natural history approaches is either absent or insufficient for concluding that the eggs of podoctids are conspecific.
Permanent Link: http://hdl.handle.net/11104/0288922