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Brain mass explains prey size selection better than beak, gizzard and body size in a benthivorous duck species

Prey size selection in some bird species is determined by the size of the beak. However, we assumed for bird species swallowing whole prey that a cognitive process may be involved. As cognitive feature, brain mass was used. We hypothesized that the mass of the brain was more strongly positively corr...

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Autores principales: Laursen, Karsten, Møller, Anders Pape
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Public Library of Science 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8009388/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33784342
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0248615
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author Laursen, Karsten
Møller, Anders Pape
author_facet Laursen, Karsten
Møller, Anders Pape
author_sort Laursen, Karsten
collection PubMed
description Prey size selection in some bird species is determined by the size of the beak. However, we assumed for bird species swallowing whole prey that a cognitive process may be involved. As cognitive feature, brain mass was used. We hypothesized that the mass of the brain was more strongly positively correlated with prey size than morphological features such as beak volume, gizzard mass and body mass. We tested this hypothesis on eiders Somateria mollissima that swallow the prey whole, by using mean and maximum size of nine prey categories. Eiders were collected at the main wintering grounds in Denmark. As index of brain mass we used head volume, which is positively correlated with brain mass (r(2) = 0.73). Head volume of eiders was significantly, positive correlated with mean and maximum size of blue mussels Mytilus edulis, razor clams Ensis directus and all prey sizes combined and the maximum size of draft whelk Hinia reticulata and conch Buccinum undatum. Gizzard mass was also significantly positively correlated with maximum size of draft whelk and conch. Beak volume and body mass was not significantly correlated with the size of any of the nine food items. Analyses of effect size for organs showed that head volume was positively related to prey size, whereas beak volume, gizzard mass and body mass did not show a significant positive relationship. These results indicate that cognitive processes connected to brain mass may be involved in prey size selection by eiders.
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spelling pubmed-80093882021-04-07 Brain mass explains prey size selection better than beak, gizzard and body size in a benthivorous duck species Laursen, Karsten Møller, Anders Pape PLoS One Research Article Prey size selection in some bird species is determined by the size of the beak. However, we assumed for bird species swallowing whole prey that a cognitive process may be involved. As cognitive feature, brain mass was used. We hypothesized that the mass of the brain was more strongly positively correlated with prey size than morphological features such as beak volume, gizzard mass and body mass. We tested this hypothesis on eiders Somateria mollissima that swallow the prey whole, by using mean and maximum size of nine prey categories. Eiders were collected at the main wintering grounds in Denmark. As index of brain mass we used head volume, which is positively correlated with brain mass (r(2) = 0.73). Head volume of eiders was significantly, positive correlated with mean and maximum size of blue mussels Mytilus edulis, razor clams Ensis directus and all prey sizes combined and the maximum size of draft whelk Hinia reticulata and conch Buccinum undatum. Gizzard mass was also significantly positively correlated with maximum size of draft whelk and conch. Beak volume and body mass was not significantly correlated with the size of any of the nine food items. Analyses of effect size for organs showed that head volume was positively related to prey size, whereas beak volume, gizzard mass and body mass did not show a significant positive relationship. These results indicate that cognitive processes connected to brain mass may be involved in prey size selection by eiders. Public Library of Science 2021-03-30 /pmc/articles/PMC8009388/ /pubmed/33784342 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0248615 Text en © 2021 Laursen, Møller http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
spellingShingle Research Article
Laursen, Karsten
Møller, Anders Pape
Brain mass explains prey size selection better than beak, gizzard and body size in a benthivorous duck species
title Brain mass explains prey size selection better than beak, gizzard and body size in a benthivorous duck species
title_full Brain mass explains prey size selection better than beak, gizzard and body size in a benthivorous duck species
title_fullStr Brain mass explains prey size selection better than beak, gizzard and body size in a benthivorous duck species
title_full_unstemmed Brain mass explains prey size selection better than beak, gizzard and body size in a benthivorous duck species
title_short Brain mass explains prey size selection better than beak, gizzard and body size in a benthivorous duck species
title_sort brain mass explains prey size selection better than beak, gizzard and body size in a benthivorous duck species
topic Research Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8009388/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33784342
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0248615
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