Energetic Demands During Incubation and Chick Rearing in a Uniparental and a Biparental Shorebird Breeding in the High Arctic

Tulp, Ingrid; Schekkerman, H.; Bruinzeel, Leo W.; Jukema, Joop; Visser, G. Henk; Piersma, Theunis

doi:10.1525/auk.2009.07181

Cited by 28 publications

(28 citation statements)

References 31 publications

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“…Though laboratory studies have indicated that younger chicks may be highly vulnerable to impacts of temperature and food availability19, our results indicate that the behaviour of brooding adults appears to diminish this impact in the wild, at least for chicks less than 5 days old. As adults tend to brood young for longer periods of time as ambient temperatures decrease22, increases in temperature during the brood rearing season could also have the potential to alleviate costs of parental care, especially for uniparental species for which these costs are particularly high23.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Arctic-nesting birds find physiological relief in the face of trophic constraints

McKinnon

Nol

Juillet

2013

Sci Rep

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A climate-induced phenological mismatch between the timing of reproduction and the timing of food resource peaks is one of the key hypothesized effects of climate change on wildlife. Though supported as a mechanism of population decline in birds, few studies have investigated whether the same temperature increases that drive this mismatch have the potential to decrease energetic costs of growth and compensate for the potential negative effects of reduced food availability. We generated independent indices of climate and resource availability and quantified their effects on growth of Dunlin (Calidris alpina) chicks, in the sub-arctic tundra of Churchill, Manitoba during the summers of 2010–2011 and found that when resource availability was below average, above average growth could be maintained in the presence of increasing temperatures. These results provide evidence that chicks may find physiological relief from the trophic constraints hypothesized by climate change studies.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Arctic-nesting birds find physiological relief in the face of trophic constraints

McKinnon

Nol

Juillet

2013

Sci Rep

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“…Furthermore, there may be three reasons why this assumption is not supported at my study site. First, if prey availability was very limited then males should not have been able to gain body mass during incubation, especially considering that breeding male Dunlins have substantially higher energetic costs than breeding females (> 25% higher daily energy expenditure; Tulp et al 2009). There is also no reason why males should be more successful foragers than females, or that they are able to spend more time foraging.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Body mass dynamics during incubation and duration of parental care in Pacific Dunlins Calidris alpina pacifica: a test of the differential parental capacity hypothesis

Jamieson

2012

Ibis

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Breeding is energetically expensive and individuals face a trade‐off between current and future breeding investment. Due to their production of large eggs, female birds are thought to have substantially higher initial energetic investments than males, which decrease the female's offspring rearing capacity. The differential parental capacity hypothesis argues that this large initial investment limits the ability of female shorebirds to provide extended parental care, which can ultimately lead to offspring desertion. This hypothesis predicts that (1) during early incubation females will be in poorer condition than males, (2) both sexes will lose condition during incubation, but the decline in females will be slower than the decline in males and (3) there will be a positive relationship between female condition and the duration of maternal brood care. These predictions were tested using data on body mass adjusted for body size (as a proxy for condition) and parental care from Pacific Dunlins Calidris alpina pacifica nesting on the Yukon Kuskokwim Delta, Alaska. None of the predictions received support: females were heavier than males in early incubation, the overall pattern during incubation was that males gained mass while female mass remained relatively constant, and there was no relationship between female mass and maternal brood care duration. These results suggest that the factors influencing parental care decisions are more complex than a parent simply caring until it is physiologically unable to do so.

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“…For example, ambient temperature (T a ) influences the percentage of time female little stints (Calidris minuta) spend brooding and foraging (i.e. females brood more when T a is low) (Tulp et al, 2009). To reduce egg desiccation, female prairie skinks (Eumeces septentrionalis) increase their egg-brooding behaviors when the nest substrate is relatively dry (Somma and Fawcett, 1989).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Parental behavior in pythons is responsive to both the hydric and thermal dynamics of the nest

Stahlschmidt

DeNardo

2010

Journal of Experimental Biology

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SUMMARYParental behavior contributes to the success of a diverse array of taxa, and female-only nest attendance is particularly widespread. Python egg-brooding behavior is an intriguing example of female-only nest attendance because it significantly influences several critical developmental variables, namely embryonic predation, hydration, respiration and temperature. During brooding, females predominately adopt a tightly coiled posture that reduces the exchange of heat, water vapor, O 2 and CO 2 between the nest and clutch environment, which benefits egg water balance at the cost of respiration. To determine the plasticity of this important behavior, we manipulated nest temperature and humidity while monitoring nest-clutch thermal, hydric and respiratory relationships to test the hypothesis that female Children's pythons (Antaresia childreni) modify their egg-brooding behavior due to an interaction between environmental thermal and hydric conditions. During moderate and high nest humidity treatments (23 and 32 g m -3 H 2 O, respectively), females spent more time coiling tightly when the nest was cooling than when it was warming, which benefited clutch temperature. However, brooding females in low-humidity nest environments (13 g m -3 H 2 O) showed a high frequency of tight coiling even when the nest was warming; thus, nest temperature and humidity had an interactive effect on egg-brooding behavior in support of our hypothesis. Our results also suggest that certain egg-brooding behaviors (i.e. postural adjustments) are more energetically costly to females than other behaviors (i.e. tight coiling). In sum, we provide empirical support for the adaptive plasticity of python egg-brooding behavior, which offers insight into the general significance of female-only nest attendance in animals.

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Energetic Demands During Incubation and Chick Rearing in a Uniparental and a Biparental Shorebird Breeding in the High Arctic

Cited by 28 publications

References 31 publications

Arctic-nesting birds find physiological relief in the face of trophic constraints

Arctic-nesting birds find physiological relief in the face of trophic constraints

Body mass dynamics during incubation and duration of parental care in Pacific Dunlins Calidris alpina pacifica: a test of the differential parental capacity hypothesis

Parental behavior in pythons is responsive to both the hydric and thermal dynamics of the nest

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