Abstract
Heterogeneity in the intrinsic quality and nutritional condition of individuals affects reproductive success and consequently fitness. Black brant (Branta bernicla nigricans) are long-lived, migratory, specialist herbivores. Long migratory pathways and short summer breeding seasons constrain the time and energy available for reproduction, thus magnifying life-history trade-offs. These constraints, combined with long lifespans and trade-offs between current and future reproductive value, provide a model system to examine the role of individual heterogeneity in driving life-history strategies and individual heterogeneity in fitness. We used hierarchical Bayesian models to examine reproductive trade-offs, modeling the relationships between within-year measures of reproductive energy allocation and among-year demographic rates of individual females breeding on the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta, Alaska, using capture–recapture and reproductive data from 1988 to 2014. We generally found that annual survival tended to be buffered against variation in reproductive investment, while breeding probability varied considerably over the range of clutch size-laying date combinations. We provide evidence for relationships between breeding probability and clutch size, breeding probability and nest initiation date, and an interaction between clutch size and initiation date. Average lifetime clutch size also had a weak positive relationship with apparent survival probability. Our results support the use of demographic buffering strategies for black brant. These results also indirectly suggest associations among environmental conditions during growth, fitness, and energy allocation, highlighting the effects of early growth conditions on individual heterogeneity, and subsequently, lifetime reproductive investment.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 15164-15173 |
| Number of pages | 10 |
| Journal | Ecology and Evolution |
| Volume | 11 |
| Issue number | 21 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Nov 2021 |
Funding
We thank our sponsors, the Sedinger and Williams laboratories at the University of Nevada, Reno, and our reviewers. We particularly thank the over 200 technicians, volunteers, and graduate students who collected data at the Tutakoke River Brant colony. Fieldwork was funded by the Alaska Science Center, U. S. Geological Survey, Migratory Bird Management Region 7, U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Ducks Unlimited, the Morro Bay Brant Group, Phil Jebbia (in memory of Marnie Shepherd), and the National Science Foundation (OPP 9214971, DEB 9815383, OPP 9985931, OPP 0196406, DEB 0743152, DEB 1252656). TVR and MGL were supported by the Bonnycastle Fellowship in Wetland and Waterfowl Biology from the Institute for Wetland and Waterfowl Research, Ducks Unlimited Canada. Researchers followed the University of Nevada, Reno's protocol for ethical conduct of research (https://www.unr.edu/administrative-manual/6000-6999-curricula-teaching-research/6515-ethical-standards-in-the-conduct-of-research). Research followed The Guidelines to the Use of Wild Birds in Research and was approved by either the Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee of the University of Alaska Fairbanks or the University of Nevada Reno (most recent protocol number 00056). We thank our sponsors, the Sedinger and Williams laboratories at the University of Nevada, Reno, and our reviewers. We particularly thank the over 200 technicians, volunteers, and graduate students who collected data at the Tutakoke River Brant colony. Fieldwork was funded by the Alaska Science Center, U. S. Geological Survey, Migratory Bird Management Region 7, U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Ducks Unlimited, the Morro Bay Brant Group, Phil Jebbia (in memory of Marnie Shepherd), and the National Science Foundation (OPP 9214971, DEB 9815383, OPP 9985931, OPP 0196406, DEB 0743152, DEB 1252656). TVR and MGL were supported by the Bonnycastle Fellowship in Wetland and Waterfowl Biology from the Institute for Wetland and Waterfowl Research, Ducks Unlimited Canada. Researchers followed the University of Nevada, Reno's protocol for ethical conduct of research ( https://www.unr.edu/administrative‐manual/6000‐6999‐curricula‐teaching‐research/6515‐ethical‐standards‐in‐the‐conduct‐of‐research ). Research followed The Guidelines to the Use of Wild Birds in Research and was approved by either the Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee of the University of Alaska Fairbanks or the University of Nevada Reno (most recent protocol number 00056).
| Funders | Funder number |
|---|---|
| Ducks Unlimited | |
| 00056 | |
| University of Nevada | |
| DEB 1252656, DEB 0743152, OPP 0196406, OPP 9214971, OPP 9985931, DEB 9815383 | |
| University of Nevada, Reno | |
Keywords
- black brant
- breeding probability
- fitness
- life-history
- reproduction
- survival
- trade-offs
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