European springtime temperature synchronises ibex horn growth across the eastern Swiss Alps
Abstract Direct effects of climate change on animal physiology, and indirect impacts from disruption of seasonal synchrony and breakdown of trophic interactions are particularly severe in Arctic and Alpine ecosystems. Unravelling biotic from abiotic drivers, however, remains challenging because high...
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crwiley:10.1111/ele.12231 2024-09-30T14:30:59+00:00 European springtime temperature synchronises ibex horn growth across the eastern Swiss Alps Büntgen, Ulf Liebhold, Andrew Jenny, Hannes Mysterud, Atle Egli, Simon Nievergelt, Daniel Stenseth, Nils C. Bollmann, Kurt Gaillard, Jean‐Michel 2013 http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/ele.12231 https://api.wiley.com/onlinelibrary/tdm/v1/articles/10.1111%2Fele.12231 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/ele.12231 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full-xml/10.1111/ele.12231 en eng Wiley http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/ Ecology Letters volume 17, issue 3, page 303-313 ISSN 1461-023X 1461-0248 journal-article 2013 crwiley https://doi.org/10.1111/ele.12231 2024-09-05T05:08:18Z Abstract Direct effects of climate change on animal physiology, and indirect impacts from disruption of seasonal synchrony and breakdown of trophic interactions are particularly severe in Arctic and Alpine ecosystems. Unravelling biotic from abiotic drivers, however, remains challenging because high‐resolution animal population data are often limited in space and time. Here, we show that variation in annual horn growth (an indirect proxy for individual performance) of 8043 male Alpine ibex ( Capra ibex ) over the past four decades is well synchronised among eight disjunct colonies in the eastern Swiss Alps. Elevated March to May temperatures, causing premature melting of Alpine snowcover, earlier plant phenology and subsequent improvement of ibex food resources, fuelled annual horn growth. These results reveal dependency of local trophic interactions on large‐scale climate dynamics, and provide evidence that declining herbivore performance is not a universal response to global warming even for high‐altitude populations that are also harvested. Article in Journal/Newspaper Arctic Climate change Global warming Wiley Online Library Arctic Ecology Letters 17 3 303 313 |
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Wiley Online Library |
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crwiley |
language |
English |
description |
Abstract Direct effects of climate change on animal physiology, and indirect impacts from disruption of seasonal synchrony and breakdown of trophic interactions are particularly severe in Arctic and Alpine ecosystems. Unravelling biotic from abiotic drivers, however, remains challenging because high‐resolution animal population data are often limited in space and time. Here, we show that variation in annual horn growth (an indirect proxy for individual performance) of 8043 male Alpine ibex ( Capra ibex ) over the past four decades is well synchronised among eight disjunct colonies in the eastern Swiss Alps. Elevated March to May temperatures, causing premature melting of Alpine snowcover, earlier plant phenology and subsequent improvement of ibex food resources, fuelled annual horn growth. These results reveal dependency of local trophic interactions on large‐scale climate dynamics, and provide evidence that declining herbivore performance is not a universal response to global warming even for high‐altitude populations that are also harvested. |
author2 |
Gaillard, Jean‐Michel |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Büntgen, Ulf Liebhold, Andrew Jenny, Hannes Mysterud, Atle Egli, Simon Nievergelt, Daniel Stenseth, Nils C. Bollmann, Kurt |
spellingShingle |
Büntgen, Ulf Liebhold, Andrew Jenny, Hannes Mysterud, Atle Egli, Simon Nievergelt, Daniel Stenseth, Nils C. Bollmann, Kurt European springtime temperature synchronises ibex horn growth across the eastern Swiss Alps |
author_facet |
Büntgen, Ulf Liebhold, Andrew Jenny, Hannes Mysterud, Atle Egli, Simon Nievergelt, Daniel Stenseth, Nils C. Bollmann, Kurt |
author_sort |
Büntgen, Ulf |
title |
European springtime temperature synchronises ibex horn growth across the eastern Swiss Alps |
title_short |
European springtime temperature synchronises ibex horn growth across the eastern Swiss Alps |
title_full |
European springtime temperature synchronises ibex horn growth across the eastern Swiss Alps |
title_fullStr |
European springtime temperature synchronises ibex horn growth across the eastern Swiss Alps |
title_full_unstemmed |
European springtime temperature synchronises ibex horn growth across the eastern Swiss Alps |
title_sort |
european springtime temperature synchronises ibex horn growth across the eastern swiss alps |
publisher |
Wiley |
publishDate |
2013 |
url |
http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/ele.12231 https://api.wiley.com/onlinelibrary/tdm/v1/articles/10.1111%2Fele.12231 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/ele.12231 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full-xml/10.1111/ele.12231 |
geographic |
Arctic |
geographic_facet |
Arctic |
genre |
Arctic Climate change Global warming |
genre_facet |
Arctic Climate change Global warming |
op_source |
Ecology Letters volume 17, issue 3, page 303-313 ISSN 1461-023X 1461-0248 |
op_rights |
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/ |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1111/ele.12231 |
container_title |
Ecology Letters |
container_volume |
17 |
container_issue |
3 |
container_start_page |
303 |
op_container_end_page |
313 |
_version_ |
1811635684887232512 |