10 Examples of Poikilothermic Animals - encyclopedia

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Content

Characteristics and behavior
Advantages and disadvantages
Poikilotherms settings
Exceptions
Examples of poikilothermic animals

The poikilothermic animals (more recently called ‘ectotherms’) are those that regulate their temperature based on ambient temperature.

This happens because they do not have the characteristic of many other organisms, which is to be able to regulate their body temperature by generating heat: this is why these types of animals are often called 'cold-blooded' animals. The animals that are not poikilotherms are the 'homeotherms' (or 'endotherms'), among which all mammals stand out.

Characteristics and behavior

In general, the smallest poikilotherms adjust to the ambient temperature, but there are some of them that can limit extreme temperatures based on thermal behavior, and it is then that they modulate the short-term influence of temperature variability.

Recently some scientists have found that daily fluctuations in the prevailing temperature alter the sensitivity of species to warming caused by climate change, by lowering the margins of thermal safety.

Advantages and disadvantages

While endothermic animals generate heat from the energy contained in food, ectotherms they don't have to feed every day and they may even be able to go months without feeding.

This provides them with an advantage, which is offset by the fact that they cannot inhabit environments with extreme temperatures, because they are highly dependent on environmental changes: endotherms, on the other hand, can live in colder or warmer habitats.

Poikilotherms settings

As in ectotherms the regulation of temperature depends on the ability to regulate the exchange of heat with the environment, it is frequent that some must be produced for thermoregulation. These are divided into two groups:

The behavioral adjustments they are changes in behavior looking for areas in the environment where the temperature is favorable to activities. There are some species that are called euthermic, which can live within fairly wide ranges of body temperature.
The physiological adjustments They are those that modify metabolic rhythms at the prevailing temperature, in such a way that the intensity of metabolism is not modified. This type of animal performs a temperature compensation that allows them to have the same level of activity in environments with different climates: they resemble endotherms, directly regulating their metabolism regardless of body temperature.

Exceptions

There are some cases of animals that are not ectothermic, but have similar behaviors.

The regional endothermy, for example, it occurs when the temperature of the heart and gills changes with changes in environmental temperature, as happens in some groups of fish.
The facultative endothermyOn the other hand, it occurs frequently in insects that can produce heat with the trembling of their muscles, raising their body temperature for a certain time.