Individual- and population-level drivers of consistent foraging success across environments.

ABSTRACT

Individual foraging is under strong natural selection. Yet, whether individuals differ consistently in their foraging success across environments, and which individual- and population-level traits might drive such differences, is largely unknown. We addressed this question in a field experiment, conducting over 1,100 foraging trials with subpopulations of guppies, Poecilia reticulata, translocated across environments in the wild. We show that individuals consistently differed in reaching and acquiring food resources, but not control 'resources', across environments. Social individuals reached and acquired more food resources than less-social ones and males reached more food resources than females. Yet, overall, individuals were more likely to join females at resources than males, which might explain why individuals in subpopulations with relatively more females reached and acquired, on average, more food resources. Our results provide rare evidence for individual differences in foraging success across environments, driven by individual- and population-level (sex ratio) traits.