Effects of meteorological conditions on brood care in cooperatively breeding carrion crow and consequences on reproductive success

Frontiers in Zoology

Research

Vittorio Baglione¹  Daniela Canestrari¹  Eva Trapote¹ 

[1] Departamento de Biodiversidad y Gestión Ambiental, Universidad de León, Campus de Vegazana s/n, 24071, León, Spain;

关键词: Cooperative breeding;    Brood care;    Reproductive success;    Meteorological conditions;    Climate change;   

DOI  :  10.1186/s12983-023-00504-0

 received in 2023-04-14, accepted in 2023-07-18,  发布年份 2023

来源: Springer

【 摘 要 】

Meteorological stressors (e.g., temperature and rain shortage) constrain brood provisioning in some bird species, but the consequences on reproductive success have been rarely quantified. Here we show, in a cooperatively breeding population of carrion crow Corvus corone in Spain, that individual feeding rates decreased significantly with rising air temperatures both in breeders and helpers, while lack of rain was associated with a significant reduction in the effort of the male helpers as compared to the other social categories. Group coordination, measured as the degree of alternation of nest visits by carers, was also negatively affected by rising temperature. Furthermore, we found that the body condition of the nestlings worsened when temperatures were high during the rearing period. Interestingly, the analysis of a long-term data set on crow reproduction showed that nestling body condition steadily deteriorated over the last 26-years. Although many factors may concur in causing population changes, our data suggest a possible causal link between global warming, brood caring behaviour and the decline of carrion crow population in the Mediterranean climatic region of Spain.

【 授权许可】

CC BY   
© The Author(s) 2023

【 图 表 】

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