Life-history innovation to climate change:Can single-brooded migrant birds become multiple breeders?

When climatic conditions change and become outside the range experienced in the past, species may show life-history innovations allowing them to adapt in new ways. We report such an innovation for pied flycatchers Ficedula hypoleuca. Decades of breeding biological studies on pied flycatchers have rarely reported multiple breeding in this long-distance migrant. In two populations, we found 12 recent incidents of females with second broods, all produced by extremely early laying females in warm springs. As such early first broods are a recent phenomenon, because laying dates have gradually advanced over time, this innovation now allows individual females to enhance their reproductive success considerably. If laying dates continue advancing, potentially more females may become multiple breeders and selection for early (and multiple) breeding phenotypes increases, which may accelerate adaptation to climatic change

Updating known distribution models for forecasting climate change impact on endangered species

To plan endangered species conservation and to design adequate management programmes, it is necessary to predict their distributional response to climate change, especially under the current situation of rapid change. However, these predictions are customarily done by relating de novo the distribution of the species with climatic conditions with no regard of previously available knowledge about the factors affecting the species distribution. We propose to take advantage of known species distribution models, but proceeding to update them with the variables yielded by climatic models before projecting them to the future. To exemplify our proposal, the availability of suitable habitat across Spain for the endangered Bonelli’s Eagle (Aquila fasciata) was modelled by updating a pre-existing model based on current climate and topography to a combination of different general circulation models and Special Report on Emissions Scenarios. Our results suggested that the main threat for this endangered species would not be climate change, since all forecasting models show that its distribution will be maintained and increased in mainland Spain for all the XXI century. We remark on the importance of linking conservation biology with distribution modelling by updating existing models, frequently available for endangered species, considering all the known factors conditioning the species’ distribution, instead of building new models that are based on climate change variables only.Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación and FEDER (project CGL2009-11316/BOS

Democracy, protest and public sphere in Russia after the 2011–2012 anti-government protests: digital media at stake

The 2011–2012 Russian protest mobilisations were largely enabled by the rise of social networks. Social and technological advancements paired to pave the way for the ‘biggest protests since the fall of USSR’. Ubiquitous and uncensored social media facilitated the networking and mobilisation for this protest activity: Liberal masses were able to share and discuss their grievances, unite and coordinate online for the offline protest. The digitally savvy protest public developed to confront the government, which appeared to be astonished by the scale of protest. Those mobilisations marked an important gap between the government’s conception of the society and the real state of resistance. This article studies three main hypotheses regarding the potential of the protest movement in Russia. The hypotheses were drawn from recent sociological, political and media studies on Russian resistance. Current research aims to contribute to the debate from the digital media perspective. It therefore evaluates three main assumptions: Digital media have the potential to empower, dependent upon the relevant political, social and economic factors; digital media isolates protest publics and therefore may be more useful for the government than the resistance; and recent censorship of digital media communication signals a tightening of both formal and informal restrictions against opposition and protest politics. This article uses theoretical and factual evidence on the limitations of democracy and the public sphere and conceptualises the government’s management of resistance in Russia during and after the 2011–2012 protests. It studies how the hybrid political regime in Russia balances restrictions on freedom of speech with strengthened state propaganda and how it mediates media oppression and invites self-censorship. Finally, it examines how the state communication watchdog has recently focused its attention at the digital realm. This move confirms the importance of the online protest communication for the Russian political environment. Yet the state’s acknowledgement of digital political resistance may lead to further oppression and curbing of this emerging component of Russian politics

Climate-induced phenology shifts linked to range expansions in species with multiple reproductive cycles per year

Advances in phenology (the annual timing of species’ life-cycles) in response to climate change are generally viewed as bioindicators of climate change, but have not been considered as predictors of range expansions. Here, we show that phenology advances combine with the number of reproductive cycles per year (voltinism) to shape abundance and distribution trends in 130 species of British Lepidoptera, in response to ~0.5 °C spring-temperature warming between 1995 and 2014. Early adult emergence in warm years resulted in increased within- and between-year population growth for species with multiple reproductive cycles per year (n = 39 multivoltine species). By contrast, early emergence had neutral or negative consequences for species with a single annual reproductive cycle (n = 91 univoltine species), depending on habitat specialisation. We conclude that phenology advances facilitate polewards range expansions in species exhibiting plasticity for both phenology and voltinism, but may inhibit expansion by less flexible species

Global health activists' lessons on building social movements for Health for all

The People's Health Movement (PHM) was formed in 2000 and drew inspiration from the Alma Ata Declaration on Primary Health Care's 'Health for All' (1978). Since then PHM has been an active part of a global counter-hegemonic social movement. This study aimed to gain insights on social movement building, drawing on the successes and failures reported by activists over their experiences of working in the Health for All social movement to improve health, justice and equity. Methods: Qualitative research methods were employed in this study to capture complex and historical narratives of individual activists, through semi-structured interviews and subsequent thematic analysis of transcripts. The research design and analysis were informed by social movement theory and literature on health activism as a pathway for social change

The effect of climate change on avian offspring production: A global meta-analysis

Climate change affects timing of reproduction in many bird species, but few studies have investigated its influence on annual reproductive output. Here, we assess changes in the annual production of young by female breeders in 201 populations of 104 bird species (N = 745,962 clutches) covering all continents between 1970 and 2019. Overall, average offspring production has declined in recent decades, but considerable differences were found among species and populations. A total of 56.7% of populations showed a declining trend in offspring production (significant in 17.4%), whereas 43.3% exhibited an increase (significant in 10.4%). The results show that climatic changes affect offspring production through compounded effects on ecological and life history traits of species. Migratory and larger-bodied species experienced reduced offspring production with increasing temperatures during the chick-rearing period, whereas smaller-bodied, sedentary species tended to produce more offspring. Likewise, multi-brooded species showed increased breeding success with increasing temperatures, whereas rising temperatures were unrelated to repro- ductive success in single-brooded species. Our study suggests that rapid declines in size of bird populations reported by many studies from different parts of the world are driven only to a small degree by changes in the production of young

Nest defence in an altricial bird with uniparental care: the influence of offspring age, brood size, stage of the breeding season and predator type

This study examines factors affecting nest defence in Aquatic Warblers Acrocephalus paludicola, a passerine species with uniparental (female) care. Stuffed predators, the Hen Harrier Circus cyaneus and the Polecat Mustela putorius, were presented at nests at various stages of the breeding cycle throughout the breeding season. The intensity of nest defence increased as the breeding cycle progressed and the offspring value hypothesis explained this pattern better than the vulnerability hypothesis. The number of nestlings and time of the breeding season (date) did not affect the level of nest defence. The results suggest that the nest defence behaviour of Aquatic Warblers was predator-specific. As expected, females' defence behaviour towards the mammalian predator was more risk-prone than that towards the avian one: the Polecat was approached more closely with a greater number of flights. Also the vocalisations given towards the two predators were different: in the presence of the polecat, compared with the harrier, loud, conspicuous "trr" calls were more frequent