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Biology 4620 second half of term outline 2019

Nest, incubation and coloniality – (insulated) container for during incubation (embryonic development outside parent’s body) – types: none plover, burrow/cavity woodpecker puffin, mud Cliff Swallow, plant material Passeriform, floating , communal grass Sociable Weaver, saliva Edible-nest Swiftlet, compost nest building is an innate behaviour Weaver Finch incubation - warming using brood patches (lacking in Sulidae and inter-specific brood parasites) - usually shared Emperor , period 10-90+ days egg neglect Ancient Murrelet (variable resistance to chilling and overheating) egg size 2-25% of body mass /Ancient Murrelet coloniality – , sea , marsh nesting , aerial insectivores, seed eating birds coloniality – why?: food distribution, habitat limitation, information center Osprey, vigilance, predator mobbing – costs?: competition for food murre and mates, EPCs, diseases and parasites

Migration Definition – regular distance movement (in some cases extreme) to and from breeding and non- breeding geographic regions (cf. dispersal = one way movements) – Costs: energy, mortality risk – Examples: Arctic (NB<>SW), Wilson’s Storm-petrel (SB<>NW). North American warblers Yellow-rumped (short), Magnolia (medium), Blackpoll (long). Fuel is fat Blackpoll Warbler. How-studied: Emlen funnel black ink indicated migration orientation, RADAR, rings (bands) tagging and recovery, satellite tags, VHF tags Seasonal timing, zugunruhe, hormones, environmental cues (daylength and weather). Daily timing mostly night exceptions jays, large flycatchers, blackbirds, aerial insectivores. Altitudes. Navigation: visual landmarks, solar compass, celestial navigation, geomagnetism Rock Pigeon, olfaction(?). Learning (geese) and genetically programmed flight direction Blackcap. Artificial light attraction as a problem – kills at lit structures.

Parental care Definition: effort (incubation, brooding protection, provisioning, teaching) expended by parents to raise offspring to independence – investment concept. Costs: energy, time, mortality risk. Conflicts (parent vs. parent vs. offspring). Sharing of effort between sexes – monogamy – differential roles (provisions versus nest defense) raptors - birds iteroparous – tradeoff between survival and lifetime reproductive success optimizes clutch size. Chick conflicted with parents because of their short-term interests (parent-offspring conflict) Blue Tit. Offspring development patterns: superprecocial Blac- headed , Megapode moundbuilder, precocial plover, Ancient Murrelet, semiprecocial Gull, altricial . Intra-specific brood parasitism – def’n – ducks, Nearctic - Inter-specific brood parasitism – def’n – Common , cowbirds, honeyguides, Black-headed Duck. Parasite tactics: egg mimicry, chick mimicry, nestling behaviour. Host tactics: egg recognition and rejection, egg and palate colour markers. Host-parasite arms-races. Destruction in host populations Kirtlands’s Warbler, parasite range expansions. Cooperative breeding – def’n – bee-eaters, Dunnocks, anis, Rallidae, – reasons for = limitations on breeding – Kin Selection.

Demography Def’n: quantifying population parameters of birds – for Life History Theory, for understanding changes in populations – age at first breeding, r (reproductive rate, number of young produced, fecundity), K annual survival, total population size, relative population size changing. How measured: bird counts & surveys, capture-mark-resight (recapture), direct observation of . Stable population: births + immigration = deaths + emigration. Mortality event measurement: carcass count vs. detection rate vs. estimated death toll. R-selected species (ducks, galliforms) versus K-selected species (auks, , vultures). Program MARK – survival analysis (environmental covariates e.g., weather Least Auklet and individual covariates e.g., bill length – inferences about survival). Longevity records Royal , Oystercatcher. Single versus multiple broods Song Thrush. Delayed age at first breeding in K-selected species. Clutch size David Lack hypothesis. Breeding success – determined by food availability, predation, parasitism, disease, weather catastrophes (e.g., El Nino), brood parasitism.

Sexual selection Darwin 1871 Def’n: The kind of natural selection that operates on traits solely as far as their role in determining mating success is concerned, or, the kind of selection relating only to traits that affect mating success (natural selection > all other traits). Inter- (mate choice) versus intra- (fighting) sexual selection. Sexual selection is not itself mate choice. Sexual selection in polygyny (Long-tailed Widowbird, Red-winged Blackbird), monogamy (Barn Swallow, House Finch, European Starling), mutual sexual selection (Crested Auklet), in polyandry (Red Phalarope) – all driven by mating preferences. Why the preferences? Models: Fisherian Runaway Runaway coevolution between arbitrary preferences and arbitrary traits, Viability indicator Coevolution between preference and trait that signals viability, Sensory exploitation Pre-existing preference (naturally selected sensory bias).

Community Ecology Bird community def’n: set of species coexisting in one habitat. Objective: to explain competition, habitat structure, and environmental change in determining this diversity, and to explain geographic patterns of diversity. Geographical, climate, vegetation influences on avian species diversity. Seasonal (annual), decadal (plant succession) and long term (millennia) patterns. Tropical versus boreal diversity woodpeckers Labrador versus Ecuador. Competitive exclusion principle warblers, auks (not?), Caribbean , ecological character displacement - Darwin’s finches. Closed versus open community theory. Relevence of introduced and invasive species House Sparrow, European Starling to community ecology.

Conservation I Anthropocene (def’n). Background: bird diversity in Pliocene, Pleistocene, Holocene, Anthropocene (natural vs. anthropogenic stressors). Situation: 10% of birds are critically endangered. Diversity in tropical forests (formerly 12% now <5% of earth) – threatened spp. are tropical . Endangered defn. Threatened def’n. Anthropogenically extinct North American birds (7 spp.) Passenger Pigeon, Eskimo Curlew, Carolina Parakeet, Bachman’s Warbler, Ivory-billed Woodpecker, Great Auk, Labrador Duck. Human colonizations of the planet: 30Kbp, North America and Caribbean 15-12Kbp, Pacific (3-1Kbp), world (Europeans) 0.5Kbp. Introductions to islands of exotic spp. (examples). Dodo and Solitaire. Captain Cook. Hawaiian birds Po’ouli discovered 1973 extinct 2004. Domestic and feral cats, windows and towers mortality, habitat loss, pesticides DDT, Rachel Carson, Peregrine, Swainson’s Hawk, neonicotinoid, industrial forestry, habitat loss, rapid global warming due to burning of fossil carbon.

Conservation II Online … Migratory Bird Treaty Act 1916-1918, US Endangered Species Act 1973, Canadian Species at Risk Act 2006

The Newfoundland turr hunt online

Choice of FINAL EXAM short essay questions (do only four)

worth 50% of this exam and 15% of your final mark!

1. Describe the basics of avian demography – what are the crucial parameters, how are they measured and how do these vary among bird species, and why? How does variation in life history across the Aves relate to particular bird groups’ vulnerability, and different conservation actions to reverse population declines in different groups of bird?

2. Briefly summarize past and current threats to avian biodiversity worldwide, the regions and avifaunas and species that are threatened or extinct, the all causes of species loss and population collapses. Then describe legislative and other practical efforts to conserve bird populations and species, and provide five separate key scientific recommendations that if followed would reverse avian biodiversity loss and population declines.

3. Discuss avian inter- and intra-specific brood parasitism from evolutionary, ecological and taxonomic/phylogenetic perspectives (i.e., example species), putting this into perspective related to the costs and benefits of parental care.

4. Review key aspects of vocal communication in birds: structure and function of the syrinx (and other sound producing structures), categorization of calls and call repertoires, individual recognition, bird song form, development and function

5. Review avian structure and function related to structure and growth, types, as ornaments, wing and tail shape and functions thereof, maintenance, moults and + structural versus pigmented colour + flight and aerodynamics.

6. Provide a review of the Newfoundland murre hunt, emphasizing conservation, murre winter ecology, the development of management legislation to protect murre populations, and what is happening now.

7. The relation of sex, mating systems, sexual selection, reproductive physiology and of birds to ecology – review the crucial patterns of cause and effect that have produced what we see now in modern birds (i.e., review all types of mating systems, associated taxa, and the ecological forces driving them).

8. Provide a review of avian community ecology – what is this field of study directed to answering? How do latitude, climate, ecosystem age and competition determine the structure of bird communities and avian species diversity? Are competitive exclusion and niche useful here (provide examples)?