Costs of reproduction in a long-lived bird: large clutch size is associated with low survival in the presence of a highly virulent disease
Fitness costs of reproduction are expected to be more pronounced when the environmental conditions deteriorate. We took advantage of a natural experiment to investigate the costs of reproduction among common eiders ( Somateria mollissima ) nesting at a site in the Arctic, where an avian cholera epiz...
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Online Access: | http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2008.0704 https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/pdf/10.1098/rsbl.2008.0704 https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/full-xml/10.1098/rsbl.2008.0704 |
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crroyalsociety:10.1098/rsbl.2008.0704 2024-09-15T18:36:00+00:00 Costs of reproduction in a long-lived bird: large clutch size is associated with low survival in the presence of a highly virulent disease Descamps, Sébastien Gilchrist, H. Grant Bêty, Joël Buttler, E. Isabel Forbes, Mark R 2009 http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2008.0704 https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/pdf/10.1098/rsbl.2008.0704 https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/full-xml/10.1098/rsbl.2008.0704 en eng The Royal Society https://royalsociety.org/journals/ethics-policies/data-sharing-mining/ Biology Letters volume 5, issue 2, page 278-281 ISSN 1744-9561 1744-957X journal-article 2009 crroyalsociety https://doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2008.0704 2024-08-26T04:21:00Z Fitness costs of reproduction are expected to be more pronounced when the environmental conditions deteriorate. We took advantage of a natural experiment to investigate the costs of reproduction among common eiders ( Somateria mollissima ) nesting at a site in the Arctic, where an avian cholera epizootic appeared at different magnitudes. We tested the predictions that larger reproductive effort (clutch size) is associated with lower survival or breeding probability the following year, and that this relationship was more pronounced under heightened exposure to the disease. Our results indicate that large clutch sizes were associated with lower survival of female eider ducks, but only when there was heightened exposure to avian cholera, as indexed by eider mortality on site. No cost was observed when cholera was absent or when lesser exposure was evident. This supports the hypothesis that fitness costs of high reproductive effort are higher under unfavourable conditions such as a disease epizootic, and further indicates that being a conservative breeder can increase survival probability, given the presence of a highly virulent disease. Article in Journal/Newspaper Somateria mollissima The Royal Society Biology Letters 5 2 278 281 |
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Open Polar |
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The Royal Society |
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crroyalsociety |
language |
English |
description |
Fitness costs of reproduction are expected to be more pronounced when the environmental conditions deteriorate. We took advantage of a natural experiment to investigate the costs of reproduction among common eiders ( Somateria mollissima ) nesting at a site in the Arctic, where an avian cholera epizootic appeared at different magnitudes. We tested the predictions that larger reproductive effort (clutch size) is associated with lower survival or breeding probability the following year, and that this relationship was more pronounced under heightened exposure to the disease. Our results indicate that large clutch sizes were associated with lower survival of female eider ducks, but only when there was heightened exposure to avian cholera, as indexed by eider mortality on site. No cost was observed when cholera was absent or when lesser exposure was evident. This supports the hypothesis that fitness costs of high reproductive effort are higher under unfavourable conditions such as a disease epizootic, and further indicates that being a conservative breeder can increase survival probability, given the presence of a highly virulent disease. |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Descamps, Sébastien Gilchrist, H. Grant Bêty, Joël Buttler, E. Isabel Forbes, Mark R |
spellingShingle |
Descamps, Sébastien Gilchrist, H. Grant Bêty, Joël Buttler, E. Isabel Forbes, Mark R Costs of reproduction in a long-lived bird: large clutch size is associated with low survival in the presence of a highly virulent disease |
author_facet |
Descamps, Sébastien Gilchrist, H. Grant Bêty, Joël Buttler, E. Isabel Forbes, Mark R |
author_sort |
Descamps, Sébastien |
title |
Costs of reproduction in a long-lived bird: large clutch size is associated with low survival in the presence of a highly virulent disease |
title_short |
Costs of reproduction in a long-lived bird: large clutch size is associated with low survival in the presence of a highly virulent disease |
title_full |
Costs of reproduction in a long-lived bird: large clutch size is associated with low survival in the presence of a highly virulent disease |
title_fullStr |
Costs of reproduction in a long-lived bird: large clutch size is associated with low survival in the presence of a highly virulent disease |
title_full_unstemmed |
Costs of reproduction in a long-lived bird: large clutch size is associated with low survival in the presence of a highly virulent disease |
title_sort |
costs of reproduction in a long-lived bird: large clutch size is associated with low survival in the presence of a highly virulent disease |
publisher |
The Royal Society |
publishDate |
2009 |
url |
http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2008.0704 https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/pdf/10.1098/rsbl.2008.0704 https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/full-xml/10.1098/rsbl.2008.0704 |
genre |
Somateria mollissima |
genre_facet |
Somateria mollissima |
op_source |
Biology Letters volume 5, issue 2, page 278-281 ISSN 1744-9561 1744-957X |
op_rights |
https://royalsociety.org/journals/ethics-policies/data-sharing-mining/ |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2008.0704 |
container_title |
Biology Letters |
container_volume |
5 |
container_issue |
2 |
container_start_page |
278 |
op_container_end_page |
281 |
_version_ |
1810479198161076224 |