Synchronous timing of return to breeding sites in a long-distance migratory seabird with ocean-scale variation in migration schedules

van Bemmelen, R.S.A.; Moe, B.; Schekkerman, H.; Hansen, S.A.; Snell, K.R.S.; Humphreys, E.M.; Mäntylä, E.; Hallgrimsson, G.T.; Gilg, O.; Ehrich, D.; Calladine, J.; Hammer, S.; Harris, S.; Lang, J.; Vignisson, S.R.; Kolbeinsson, Y.; Nuotio, K.; Sillanpää, M.; Sittler, B.; Sokolov, A.; Klaassen, R.H.G.; Phillips, R.A.; Tulp, I.. 2024 Synchronous timing of return to breeding sites in a long-distance migratory seabird with ocean-scale variation in migration schedules. Movement Ecology, 12, 22. 15, pp. https://doi.org/10.1186/s40462-024-00459-9

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Text (Open Access) © The Author(s) 2024. Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated in a credit line to the data. skua.pdf Available under License Creative Commons Attribution 4.0. Download (1MB) | Preview

Abstract/Summary

Background Migratory birds generally have tightly scheduled annual cycles, in which delays can have carry-over effects on the timing of later events, ultimately impacting reproductive output. Whether temporal carry-over effects are more pronounced among migrations over larger distances, with tighter schedules, is a largely unexplored question. Methods We tracked individual Arctic Skuas Stercorarius parasiticus, a long-distance migratory seabird, from eight breeding populations between Greenland and Siberia using light-level geolocators. We tested whether migration schedules among breeding populations differ as a function of their use of seven widely divergent wintering areas across the Atlantic Ocean, Mediterranean Sea and Indian Ocean. Results Breeding at higher latitudes led not only to later reproduction and migration, but also faster spring migration and shorter time between return to the breeding area and clutch initiation. Wintering area was consistent within individuals among years; and more distant areas were associated with more time spent on migration and less time in the wintering areas. Skuas adjusted the period spent in the wintering area, regardless of migration distance, which buffered the variation in timing of autumn migration. Choice of wintering area had only minor effects on timing of return at the breeding area and timing of breeding and these effects were not consistent between breeding populations. Conclusion The lack of a consistent effect of wintering area on timing of return between breeding areas indicates that individuals synchronize their arrival with others in their population despite extensive individual differences in migration strategies.

Item Type:	Publication - Article
Digital Object Identifier (DOI):	https://doi.org/10.1186/s40462-024-00459-9
ISSN:	2051-3933
Additional Keywords:	Arctic Skua; Parasitic Jaeger; Stercorarius parasiticus; Migratory connectivity; Phenology; Annual cycle; Carry-over effects
Date made live:	15 Apr 2024 10:53 +0 (UTC)
URI:	https://nora.nerc.ac.uk/id/eprint/537274

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