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Wind conditions influence breeding season movements in a nomadic polygynous shorebird

Nomadism is a behaviour where individuals respond to environmental variability with movements that seem unpredictable in timing and direction. In contrast to migration, the mechanisms underlying nomadic movements remain largely unknown. Here, we focus on a form of apparent nomadism in a polygynous s...

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Autores principales: Krietsch, Johannes, Valcu, Mihai, Kempenaers, Bart
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: The Royal Society 2020
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7031675/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32075527
http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2019.2789
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author Krietsch, Johannes
Valcu, Mihai
Kempenaers, Bart
author_facet Krietsch, Johannes
Valcu, Mihai
Kempenaers, Bart
author_sort Krietsch, Johannes
collection PubMed
description Nomadism is a behaviour where individuals respond to environmental variability with movements that seem unpredictable in timing and direction. In contrast to migration, the mechanisms underlying nomadic movements remain largely unknown. Here, we focus on a form of apparent nomadism in a polygynous shorebird, the pectoral sandpiper (Calidris melanotos). Local mating opportunities are unpredictable and most males sampled multiple sites across a considerable part of their breeding range. We test the hypothesis that individuals decided which part of the breeding range to sample in a given season based on the prevailing wind conditions. Using movement data from 80 males in combination with wind data from a global reanalysis model, we show that male pectoral sandpipers flew with wind support more often than expected by chance. Stronger wind support led to increased ground speed and was associated with a longer flight range. Long detours (loop-like flights) can be explained by individuals flying initially with the wind. Individuals did not fly westwards into the Russian Arctic without wind support, but occasionally flew eastwards into the North American Arctic against strong headwinds. Wind support might be less important for individuals flying eastwards, because their autumn migration journey will be shorter. Our study suggests that individuals of a species with low site fidelity choose their breeding site opportunistically based on the prevailing wind conditions.
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spelling pubmed-70316752020-02-26 Wind conditions influence breeding season movements in a nomadic polygynous shorebird Krietsch, Johannes Valcu, Mihai Kempenaers, Bart Proc Biol Sci Behaviour Nomadism is a behaviour where individuals respond to environmental variability with movements that seem unpredictable in timing and direction. In contrast to migration, the mechanisms underlying nomadic movements remain largely unknown. Here, we focus on a form of apparent nomadism in a polygynous shorebird, the pectoral sandpiper (Calidris melanotos). Local mating opportunities are unpredictable and most males sampled multiple sites across a considerable part of their breeding range. We test the hypothesis that individuals decided which part of the breeding range to sample in a given season based on the prevailing wind conditions. Using movement data from 80 males in combination with wind data from a global reanalysis model, we show that male pectoral sandpipers flew with wind support more often than expected by chance. Stronger wind support led to increased ground speed and was associated with a longer flight range. Long detours (loop-like flights) can be explained by individuals flying initially with the wind. Individuals did not fly westwards into the Russian Arctic without wind support, but occasionally flew eastwards into the North American Arctic against strong headwinds. Wind support might be less important for individuals flying eastwards, because their autumn migration journey will be shorter. Our study suggests that individuals of a species with low site fidelity choose their breeding site opportunistically based on the prevailing wind conditions. The Royal Society 2020-02-12 2020-02-12 /pmc/articles/PMC7031675/ /pubmed/32075527 http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2019.2789 Text en © 2020 The Authors. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Published by the Royal Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/, which permits unrestricted use, provided the original author and source are credited.
spellingShingle Behaviour
Krietsch, Johannes
Valcu, Mihai
Kempenaers, Bart
Wind conditions influence breeding season movements in a nomadic polygynous shorebird
title Wind conditions influence breeding season movements in a nomadic polygynous shorebird
title_full Wind conditions influence breeding season movements in a nomadic polygynous shorebird
title_fullStr Wind conditions influence breeding season movements in a nomadic polygynous shorebird
title_full_unstemmed Wind conditions influence breeding season movements in a nomadic polygynous shorebird
title_short Wind conditions influence breeding season movements in a nomadic polygynous shorebird
title_sort wind conditions influence breeding season movements in a nomadic polygynous shorebird
topic Behaviour
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7031675/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32075527
http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2019.2789
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