Data from: Long necks enhance and constrain foraging capacity in aquatic vertebrates ...

• Main Authors: Wilson, Rory P., Gómez-Laich, Agustina, Sala, Juan E., Dell'Omo, Giacomo, Holton, Mark D., Quintana, Flavio
• Format: Dataset
• Language: English
• Published: Dryad 2017
• Subjects: accelerometry; Phalacrocorax atriceps; diving birds; Spheniscus Magellanicus; neck length
• Online Access: https://dx.doi.org/10.5061/dryad.23vc1; https://datadryad.org/stash/dataset/doi:10.5061/dryad.23vc1

Highly specialized diving birds display substantial dichotomy in neck length with, for example, cormorants and anhingas having extreme necks, while penguins and auks have minimized necks. We attached acceleration loggers to Imperial cormorants Phalacrocorax atriceps and Magellanic penguins Spheniscus magellanicus, both foraging in waters over the Patagonian Shelf, to examine the difference in movement between their respective heads and bodies in an attempt to explain this dichotomy. The penguins had head and body attitudes and movements that broadly concurred throughout all phases of their dives. By contrast, although the cormorants followed this pattern during the descent and ascent phases of dives, during the bottom (foraging) phase of the dive, the head angle differed widely from that of the body and its dynamism (measured using vectorial dynamic acceleration) was over four times greater. A simple model indicated that having the head on an extended neck would allow these cormorants to half the energy ... : Acceleration dataDepth, body and head acceleration data from 8 Magellanic penguins and 10 Imperial cormorantsData.zip ...