Ecological conditions during winter affect sexual selection and breeding in a migratory bird

Saino, Nicola; Szép, Tibor; Ambrosini, Roberto; Romano, Maria; Møller, Anders Pape

doi:10.1098/rspb.2003.2656

Cited by 160 publications

(156 citation statements)

References 32 publications

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“…Our hypothesis is independent of these inconsistencies, however, since sexual selection on traits exhibiting environment-dependent phenotypic plasticity is not uncommon (e.g. Garant et al 2004;Saino et al 2004). Degree of change in arrival date could therefore have a sexually selected component (e.g.…”

Section: Bird Migration and Sexual Selection C N Spottiswoode And Omentioning

confidence: 92%

Sexual selection predicts advancement of avian spring migration in response to climate change

2006

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Global warming has led to earlier spring arrival of migratory birds, but the extent of this advancement varies greatly among species, and it remains uncertain to what degree these changes are phenotypically plastic responses or microevolutionary adaptations to changing environmental conditions. We suggest that sexual selection could help to understand this variation, since early spring arrival of males is favoured by female choice. Climate change could weaken the strength of natural selection opposing sexual selection for early migration, which would predict greatest advancement in species with stronger female choice. We test this hypothesis comparatively by investigating the degree of long-term change in spring passage at two ringing stations in northern Europe in relation to a synthetic estimate of the strength of female choice, composed of degree of extra-pair paternity, relative testes size and degree of sexually dichromatic plumage colouration. We found that species with a stronger index of sexual selection have indeed advanced their date of spring passage to a greater extent. This relationship was stronger for the changes in the median passage date of the whole population than for changes in the timing of first-arriving individuals, suggesting that selection has not only acted on protandrous males. These results suggest that sexual selection may have an impact on the responses of organisms to climate change, and knowledge of a species' mating system might help to inform attempts at predicting these.

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Section: Bird Migration and Sexual Selection C N Spottiswoode And Omentioning

confidence: 92%

Sexual selection predicts advancement of avian spring migration in response to climate change

2006

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“…Barn swallows (Hirundo rustica) are colonial nesting passerines that breed throughout Europe and winter in sub-Saharan Africa. Saino et al (2004) reported the relationship between reproduction and primary productivity on the wintering grounds (measured by normalized difference vegetation index; NDVI). They found that a difference in G2 s.d.…”

Section: Estimating Carry-over Effectsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Predicting the consequences of carry-over effects for migratory populations

2005

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Migratory animals present a unique challenge for predicting population size because they are influenced by events in multiple stages of the annual cycle that are separated by large geographic distances. Here, we develop a model that incorporates non-fatal carry-over effects to predict changes in population size and show how this can be integrated with predictive models of habitat loss and deterioration. Examples from Barn swallows, Greater snow geese and American redstarts show how carry-over effects can be estimated and integrated into the model. Incorporation of carry-over effects should increase the predictive power of models. However, the challenge for developing accurate predictions rests both on the ability to estimate parameters from multiple stages of the annual cycle and to understand how events between these periods interact to influence individual success.

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“…Much of this interest is based on the clear recognition that factors occurring at one period of the annual cycle can influence events occurring at another [3][4][5][6][7]. Such seasonal interactions can reveal ultimate fitness consequences of the choice of wintering and stopover locations made by birds that travel to breed.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A multi-isotope (δ¹³C, δ¹⁵N, δ²H) approach to connecting European breeding and African wintering populations of barn swallow (Hirundo rustica)

2012

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Establishing links between breeding and wintering populations of longdistance migratory birds and other animals is fundamental to several aspects of migration research. However, severe limitations in our ability to track small-bodied migratory species still limits this field despite several recent technological breakthroughs. The measurement of naturally occurring stable isotopes of several elements in the tissues of migrants that travel across isotopic gradients or isoscapes has the potential to identify large scale migratory connectivity without some of the biases associated with the use of extrinsic markers. We investigated migratory connectivity between European breeding and African wintering populations of barn swallow (Hirundo rustica) by comparing feather isotope (δ 13 C, δ 15 N, δ 2 H) values with those expected from previously established feather isotopic clusters for Africa. We used a likelihood approach to assigning individuals to molt origins that also made use of prior information provided by ring recoveries as part of the EURING and SAFRING ringing efforts. We found evidence for strong isotopic spatial structure in the dataset, supporting the notion of a migratory divide in Europe with birds breeding in the Netherlands, Denmark, Germany and Eastern Europe wintering in southern Africa and virtually all samples from Switzerland westward being assigned to clusters in the northern portion of the species' winter range. Individuals from the United Kingdom were assigned to areas including Namibia, Botswana, northern South Africa, and along the coast of Mozambique and Tanzania. Birds wintering in the northernmost region of the wintering grounds tended to breed in the southernmost region of the breeding grounds, providing some evidence of leap-frog migration. We detected a strong latitudinal threshold in feather δ 13 C in Europe for African-grown feathers, suggesting that birds breeding in southern Europe (< 50° Latitude) primarily used C3-dominated habitats in Africa, whereas birds in northern Europe (> 53° Latitude) primarily used C4-dominated habitats. Our results emphasize the power in using a multi-isotope approach to assign individuals and populations to known continental-scale isoscapes and the advantages of combining isotopic and conventional (ring recovery) information within a Bayesian assignment framework. breeding grounds where they subsequently raise more offspring [8]. Other factors influencing overwinter survival and arrival phenology of birds on the breeding grounds involve large-scale climatic events or trends experienced on the wintering grounds, or en route, and there is considerable evidence for differential vulnerability to such factors among species and subpopulations within species depending on degree of migratory connectivity [9,10].Establishing migratory connectivity has benefited from several recent technological advances involving both extrinsic and intrinsic markers that can augment the more conventional but valuable long-term ring recovery programs [11]. Notably, the 3 U...

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Ecological conditions during winter affect sexual selection and breeding in a migratory bird

Cited by 160 publications

References 32 publications

Sexual selection predicts advancement of avian spring migration in response to climate change

Sexual selection predicts advancement of avian spring migration in response to climate change

Predicting the consequences of carry-over effects for migratory populations

A multi-isotope (δ¹³C, δ¹⁵N, δ²H) approach to connecting European breeding and African wintering populations of barn swallow (Hirundo rustica)

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Ecological conditions during winter affect sexual selection and breeding in a migratory bird

Cited by 160 publications

References 32 publications

Sexual selection predicts advancement of avian spring migration in response to climate change

Sexual selection predicts advancement of avian spring migration in response to climate change

Predicting the consequences of carry-over effects for migratory populations

A multi-isotope (δ13C, δ15N, δ2H) approach to connecting European breeding and African wintering populations of barn swallow (Hirundo rustica)

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A multi-isotope (δ¹³C, δ¹⁵N, δ²H) approach to connecting European breeding and African wintering populations of barn swallow (Hirundo rustica)