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Does Foraging Performance Change with Age in Female Little Penguins (Eudyptula minor)?

Age-related changes in breeding performance are likely to be mediated through changes in parental foraging performance. We investigated the relationship of foraging performance with age in female little penguins at Phillip Island, Australia, during the guard phase of the 2005 breeding season. Foragi...

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Autores principales: Zimmer, Ilka, Ropert-Coudert, Yan, Kato, Akiko, Ancel, Andre, Chiaradia, Andre
Formato: Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Public Library of Science 2011
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3026794/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21283573
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0016098
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author Zimmer, Ilka
Ropert-Coudert, Yan
Kato, Akiko
Ancel, Andre
Chiaradia, Andre
author_facet Zimmer, Ilka
Ropert-Coudert, Yan
Kato, Akiko
Ancel, Andre
Chiaradia, Andre
author_sort Zimmer, Ilka
collection PubMed
description Age-related changes in breeding performance are likely to be mediated through changes in parental foraging performance. We investigated the relationship of foraging performance with age in female little penguins at Phillip Island, Australia, during the guard phase of the 2005 breeding season. Foraging parameters were recorded with accelerometers for birds grouped into three age-classes: (1) young, (2) middle age and (3) old females. We found the diving behaviour of middle-aged birds differed from young and old birds. The dive duration of middle age females was shorter than that of young and old birds while their dive effort (measure for dive and post-dive duration relation) was lower than that of young ones, suggesting middle-aged birds were in better physical condition than other ones. There was no difference in prey pursuit frequency or duration between age classes, but in the hunting tactic. Females pursued more prey around and after reaching the maximum depth of dives the more experienced they were (old > middle age > young), an energy saving hunting tactic by probably taking advantage of up-thrust momentum. We suggest middle age penguins forage better than young or old ones because good physical condition and foraging experience could act simultaneously.
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spelling pubmed-30267942011-01-31 Does Foraging Performance Change with Age in Female Little Penguins (Eudyptula minor)? Zimmer, Ilka Ropert-Coudert, Yan Kato, Akiko Ancel, Andre Chiaradia, Andre PLoS One Research Article Age-related changes in breeding performance are likely to be mediated through changes in parental foraging performance. We investigated the relationship of foraging performance with age in female little penguins at Phillip Island, Australia, during the guard phase of the 2005 breeding season. Foraging parameters were recorded with accelerometers for birds grouped into three age-classes: (1) young, (2) middle age and (3) old females. We found the diving behaviour of middle-aged birds differed from young and old birds. The dive duration of middle age females was shorter than that of young and old birds while their dive effort (measure for dive and post-dive duration relation) was lower than that of young ones, suggesting middle-aged birds were in better physical condition than other ones. There was no difference in prey pursuit frequency or duration between age classes, but in the hunting tactic. Females pursued more prey around and after reaching the maximum depth of dives the more experienced they were (old > middle age > young), an energy saving hunting tactic by probably taking advantage of up-thrust momentum. We suggest middle age penguins forage better than young or old ones because good physical condition and foraging experience could act simultaneously. Public Library of Science 2011-01-25 /pmc/articles/PMC3026794/ /pubmed/21283573 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0016098 Text en Zimmer 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
Zimmer, Ilka
Ropert-Coudert, Yan
Kato, Akiko
Ancel, Andre
Chiaradia, Andre
Does Foraging Performance Change with Age in Female Little Penguins (Eudyptula minor)?
title Does Foraging Performance Change with Age in Female Little Penguins (Eudyptula minor)?
title_full Does Foraging Performance Change with Age in Female Little Penguins (Eudyptula minor)?
title_fullStr Does Foraging Performance Change with Age in Female Little Penguins (Eudyptula minor)?
title_full_unstemmed Does Foraging Performance Change with Age in Female Little Penguins (Eudyptula minor)?
title_short Does Foraging Performance Change with Age in Female Little Penguins (Eudyptula minor)?
title_sort does foraging performance change with age in female little penguins (eudyptula minor)?
topic Research Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3026794/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21283573
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0016098
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