2 research outputs found
Are blackcaps sylvia atricapilla differential distance migrants by sex?
Aims: To investigate if male and female blackcaps show differences in the amplitude of migratory
movements.
Methods: The extent of movements of male and female British blackcaps were analysed using ringing recovery
records. Furthermore, through a literature review and the collection of original field data, the
sex-ratios of blackcap samples taken at several latitudes in Europe and Africa were compared.
Results: There were no differences between British male and female blackcaps in relation to wintering
latitude or distance moved during migration. Sex-ratios of blackcap samples were quite even across a wide
range of latitudes. However, there was a significantly larger proportion of females in samples of birds that
wintered in Africa.
Conclusions: Laboratory data and morphological studies have yielded inconclusive results in relation to
the question of whether or not European blackcaps are differential distance migrants. The results from the
present study suggest that British blackcaps are not differential distance migrants. Furthermore, there is,
at best, only a weak latitudinal segregation of the sexes of blackcaps wintering in Europe and Africa. The
slightly higher proportion of males in European samples, when compared to Africa, could result from a
differential behaviour of males and females in some blackcap populations, or simply result from differences
in the sex-ratios of blackcap populations breeding and wintering in different areas. An absence of
a pronounced latitudinal segregation in the size-monomorphic blackcap is interesting, and contrasts
with the pattern found in more sexually dimorphic species, such as the chiffchaff Phylloscopus collybita
or the robin Erithacus rubecula
Differential migration of chiffchaffs Phylloscopus collybita and P. ibericus in Europe and Africa
Differential migration is a widespread, but poorly understood, phenomenon in birds. In
this paper, we present the first detailed field study of differential migration in the Old
World warbler (Sylviidae) family. We studied two chiffchaff Phylloscopus [collybita ]
semispecies: the common chiffchaff P. [c. ] collybita and the Iberian chiffchaff P. [c. ]
ibericus. Using data collected at several latitudes in Europe and Africa, we present
convincing evidence for differential distance migration of sexes in chiffchaffs, with
females moving further than males. Interestingly, while there was a pronounced
gradient in the sex-ratios in Europe and North Africa (with an increasing proportion of
females with declining latitude), no clear pattern was found south of the Sahara, where
sex-ratios were more male-biased than predicted by a simple latitude model. This
suggests that, amongst the chiffchaffs wintering in West Africa, a large proportion is
composed by Iberian birds, and provides support to previous suggestions that Iberian
chiffchaffs are long distance migrants. Results from detailed studies in Senegal also
show that chiffchaffs display differential timing of spring migration, with males leaving
the winter quarters considerably earlier than females. The results are discussed in the
framework of the three main (non-mutually exclusive) hypotheses attempting to explain
the latitudinal segregation of the sexes. Given the relative failure of standard
comparative studies to discriminate between competing single-factor hypotheses to
explain differential migration, it is argued that the chiffchaff species complex might be
particularly suited to study this issue using a new approach suggested by Cristol et al.
(1999): detailed (further) comparisons between closely related species (such as the
common and the Iberian chiffchaffs) could help identifying the key factors to be
incorporated into optimality models that can predict relative distance of migration of
different sex or age classes