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Allometry of the Duration of Flight Feather Molt in Birds

We used allometric scaling to explain why the regular replacement of the primary flight feathers requires disproportionately more time for large birds. Primary growth rate scales to mass (M) as M (0.171), whereas the summed length of the primaries scales almost twice as fast (M (0.316)). The ratio o...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Rohwer, Sievert, Ricklefs, Robert E., Rohwer, Vanya G., Copple, Michelle M.
Formato: Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Public Library of Science 2009
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2690433/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19529759
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.1000132
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author Rohwer, Sievert
Ricklefs, Robert E.
Rohwer, Vanya G.
Copple, Michelle M.
author_facet Rohwer, Sievert
Ricklefs, Robert E.
Rohwer, Vanya G.
Copple, Michelle M.
author_sort Rohwer, Sievert
collection PubMed
description We used allometric scaling to explain why the regular replacement of the primary flight feathers requires disproportionately more time for large birds. Primary growth rate scales to mass (M) as M (0.171), whereas the summed length of the primaries scales almost twice as fast (M (0.316)). The ratio of length (mm) to rate (mm/day), which would be the time needed to replace all the primaries one by one, increases as the 0.14 power of mass (M (0.316)/M (0.171) = M (0.145)), illustrating why the time required to replace the primaries is so important to life history evolution in large birds. Smaller birds generally replace all their flight feathers annually, but larger birds that fly while renewing their primaries often extend the primary molt over two or more years. Most flying birds exhibit one of three fundamentally different modes of primary replacement, and the size distributions of birds associated with these replacement modes suggest that birds that replace their primaries in a single wave of molt cannot approach the size of the largest flying birds without first transitioning to a more complex mode of primary replacement. Finally, we propose two models that could account for the 1/6 power allometry between feather growth rate and body mass, both based on a length-to-surface relationship that transforms the linear, cylindrical growing region responsible for producing feather tissue into an essentially two-dimensional structure. These allometric relationships offer a general explanation for flight feather replacement requiring disproportionately more time for large birds.
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spelling pubmed-26904332009-06-15 Allometry of the Duration of Flight Feather Molt in Birds Rohwer, Sievert Ricklefs, Robert E. Rohwer, Vanya G. Copple, Michelle M. PLoS Biol Research Article We used allometric scaling to explain why the regular replacement of the primary flight feathers requires disproportionately more time for large birds. Primary growth rate scales to mass (M) as M (0.171), whereas the summed length of the primaries scales almost twice as fast (M (0.316)). The ratio of length (mm) to rate (mm/day), which would be the time needed to replace all the primaries one by one, increases as the 0.14 power of mass (M (0.316)/M (0.171) = M (0.145)), illustrating why the time required to replace the primaries is so important to life history evolution in large birds. Smaller birds generally replace all their flight feathers annually, but larger birds that fly while renewing their primaries often extend the primary molt over two or more years. Most flying birds exhibit one of three fundamentally different modes of primary replacement, and the size distributions of birds associated with these replacement modes suggest that birds that replace their primaries in a single wave of molt cannot approach the size of the largest flying birds without first transitioning to a more complex mode of primary replacement. Finally, we propose two models that could account for the 1/6 power allometry between feather growth rate and body mass, both based on a length-to-surface relationship that transforms the linear, cylindrical growing region responsible for producing feather tissue into an essentially two-dimensional structure. These allometric relationships offer a general explanation for flight feather replacement requiring disproportionately more time for large birds. Public Library of Science 2009-06-16 /pmc/articles/PMC2690433/ /pubmed/19529759 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.1000132 Text en Rohwer et al. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are properly credited.
spellingShingle Research Article
Rohwer, Sievert
Ricklefs, Robert E.
Rohwer, Vanya G.
Copple, Michelle M.
Allometry of the Duration of Flight Feather Molt in Birds
title Allometry of the Duration of Flight Feather Molt in Birds
title_full Allometry of the Duration of Flight Feather Molt in Birds
title_fullStr Allometry of the Duration of Flight Feather Molt in Birds
title_full_unstemmed Allometry of the Duration of Flight Feather Molt in Birds
title_short Allometry of the Duration of Flight Feather Molt in Birds
title_sort allometry of the duration of flight feather molt in birds
topic Research Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2690433/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19529759
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.1000132
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