15 research outputs found

    CAFF Technical Report No. 21 - ARCTIC BIRDS INTERNATIONAL BREEDING CONDITIONS SURVEY BULLETIN No. 11

    Get PDF
    CAFF Technical Report No. 21 - ARCTIC BIRDS INTERNATIONAL BREEDING CONDITIONS SURVEY BULLETIN No. 1

    現行民法典を創った人びと(3)起草委員 : 穂積陳重・富井政章・梅謙次郎

    Get PDF
    Aim Over the last two decades, thousands of northward migrating ruffs (Philomachus pugnax) have disappeared from western European staging sites. These migratory ruffs were partly temperate breeding birds, but most individuals head towards the Eurasian Arctic tundras where 95% of the global population breeds. This regional decline may represent either: (1) local loss of breeding birds in western Europe, (2) a global decline, (3) shift(s) in distribution or (4) a combination of these.Location Northern Eurasia.Methods To put the declines in western Europe in context, we analysed Arctic monitoring data from the last two decades (Soloviev & Tomkovich, 2009) to detect changes in regional breeding densities across northern Eurasia. We used a novel approach applying generalized additive modelling (GAM) and generalized estimations equations (GEE).Results We show that the global breeding population of ruffs has made a significant eastwards shift into the Asian part of the breeding range. In the European Arctic, ruffs decreased during the last 18 years. At the same time, in western Siberia, ruffs increased. In eastern Siberia, no significant population changes could be detected. These changes corroborate the finding that during northward migration, growing numbers of ruffs avoided staging areas in the Netherlands and Sweden and started migrating along a more easterly route leading into western Siberia.Main conclusions We detected an unprecedented large-scale population redistribution of ruffs and suggest that this is a response to loss of habitat quality at the traditional staging site in the Netherlands

    Growth of little stint Calidris minuta chicks on the Taimyr peninsula, Siberia

    Get PDF
    Growth of mass and linear body dimensions (bill, tarsus and wing length) was studied in the Little Stint Calidris minuta at several locations on the Taimyr Peninsula, Siberia (73 degrees-76 degrees N) in 1983-94. Little Stints fledged at near-adult body mass, at 15 days of age. Growth followed an S-shaped pattern which was best described mathematically by a logistic curve. Curves of this type showed that growth was similar between study sites and years, although there were differences in mass development during the first days after hatching, perhaps related to weather conditions. When the logistic growth curve was used, K-L (the standard measure of maximum growth rate) was 0.285. Conversion of this parameter to another S-shaped curve, the Gompertz curve which has been widely used to describe wader chick growth, yields K-G = 0.194. This is higher than predicted from an allometric relationship based on 15 other precocial wader species, and might be related to the Little Stint's high latitude breeding range

    Growth of Little Stint Calidris minuta chicks on the Taimyr Peninsula, Siberia

    No full text
    Growth of mass and linear body dimensions (bill, tarsus and wing length) was studied in the Little Stint Calidris minuta at several locations on the Taimyr Peninsula, Siberia (73 degrees-76 degrees N) in 1983-94. Little Stints fledged at near-adult body mass, at 15 days of age. Growth followed an S-shaped pattern which was best described mathematically by a logistic curve. Curves of this type showed that growth was similar between study sites and years, although there were differences in mass development during the first days after hatching, perhaps related to weather conditions. When the logistic growth curve was used, K-L (the standard measure of maximum growth rate) was 0.285. Conversion of this parameter to another S-shaped curve, the Gompertz curve which has been widely used to describe wader chick growth, yields K-G = 0.194. This is higher than predicted from an allometric relationship based on 15 other precocial wader species, and might be related to the Little Stint's high latitude breeding range

    Travelling on a budget: predictions and ecological evidence for bottlenecks in the annual cycle of long-distance migrants

    Get PDF
    Long-distance migration, and the study of the migrants who undertake these journeys, has fascinated generations of biologists. However, many aspects of the annual cycles of these migrants remain a mystery as do many of the driving forces behind the evolution and maintenance of the migrations themselves. In this article we discuss nutritional, energetic, temporal and disease-risk bottlenecks in the annual cycle of long-distance migrants, taking a sandpiper, the red knot Calidris canutus, as a focal species. Red knots have six recognized subspecies each with different migratory routes, well-known patterns of connectivity and contrasting annual cycles. The diversity of red knot annual cycles allows us to discuss the existence and the effects of bottlenecks in a comparative framework. We examine the evidence for bottlenecks focusing on the quality of breeding plumage and the timing of moult as indicators in the six subspecies. In terms of breeding plumage coloration, quality and timing of prealternate body moult (from non-breeding into breeding plumage), the longest migrating knot subspecies, Calidris canutus rogersi and Calidris canutus rufa, show the greatest impact of bottlenecking. The same is true in terms of prebasic body moult (from breeding into non-breeding plumage) which in case of both C. c. rogersi and C. c. rufa overlaps with southward migration and may even commence in the breeding grounds. To close our discussion of bottlenecks in long-distance migrants, we make predictions about how migrants might be impacted via physiological ‘trade-offs’ throughout the annual cycle, using investment in immune function as an example. We also predict how bottlenecks may affect the distribution of mortality throughout the annual cycle. We hope that this framework will be applicable to other species and types of migrants, thus expanding the comparative database for the future evaluation of seasonal selection pressures and the evolution of annual cycles in long-distance migrants. Furthermore, we hope that this synthesis of recent advancements in the knowledge of red knot annual cycles will prove useful in the ongoing attempts to model annual cycles in migratory birds

    Parental role division predicts avian preen wax cycles

    No full text
    Previous studies have shown that preen wax composition in some sandpipers shifts from the usual monoesters to diesters during the breeding season, possibly to reduce the ability of mammalian predators to find nests using olfactory cues. To investigate further the relationship between incubation and wax secretion, we examined seven sandpiper species with different incubation patterns (species in which both sexes incubate, in which only males incubate and in which only females incubate). During the breeding period, diester preen wax was secreted almost exclusively by the incubating sex in species with uniparental incubation, and by both sexes in species with biparental incubation. These findings suggest that diester preen waxes have a function that is directly related to incubation. Unexpectedly, in female-incubating Curlew Sandpiper Calidris ferruginea and Buff-breasted Sandpiper Tryngites subruficollis, some males also secreted diester preen waxes during the breeding period. This suggests that some males may in fact incubate, that these waxes may be a remnant from their evolutionary past when both sexes incubated, or that males need to be olfactorally cryptic because they are involved in the making of nest scrapes. The seasonal pattern of preen wax composition was also studied in captive male, female and female-mimicking male (`faeder¿) Ruff Philomachus pugnax. Captive female Ruff changed preen wax composition from monoesters to diesters in the spring despite the fact that no incubation took place. This suggests that circannual rhythms rather than actual incubation behaviour may trigger the shift to diester waxes. All captive male Ruff, including the faeders, continued to secrete monoesters, supporting the hypothesis that only the incubating sex secretes diesters
    corecore