Morphological Shifts of the External Flight Apparatus across the Range of a Passerine (Northern Wheatear) with Diverging Migratory Behaviour
We studied morphological differentiation in the flight apparatus of the four currently recognised sub-species of Northern Wheatears, Oenanthe oenanthe. Considering all measured birds without assigning them a priori to any sub-species we found a clinal morphological shift. Relative wing length, wing...
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ftpubmed:oai:pubmedcentral.nih.gov:3078915 2023-05-15T16:29:23+02:00 Morphological Shifts of the External Flight Apparatus across the Range of a Passerine (Northern Wheatear) with Diverging Migratory Behaviour Förschler, Marc I. Bairlein, Franz 2011-04-18 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3078915 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21533160 https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0018732 en eng Public Library of Science http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3078915 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21533160 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0018732 Förschler, Bairlein. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. CC-BY Research Article Text 2011 ftpubmed https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0018732 2013-09-03T13:35:49Z We studied morphological differentiation in the flight apparatus of the four currently recognised sub-species of Northern Wheatears, Oenanthe oenanthe. Considering all measured birds without assigning them a priori to any sub-species we found a clinal morphological shift. Relative wing length, wing pointedness, and the degree of tail forking were positively correlated with migratory distance, whereas tail length (relative to wing length) was negatively correlated. The large-sized, long-distance migrant “Greenland” Wheatear, O. o. leucorhoa, is characterized by relatively longer, broader and more pointed wings and more forked tails, similar to the smaller-sized nominate Northern Wheatear, O. o. oenanthe, from North Europe, Siberia and Russia. In contrast, the short distance migrant “Seebohm's” Wheatear, O. o. seebohmi, from northwest Africa, possesses much rounder wings, and the tail is relatively longer and less forked. Sub-species with intermediate migratory habits (different populations of nominate Northern Wheatear, O. o. oenanthe, and “Mediterranean” Northern Wheatear, O. o. libanotica) show, as expected, intermediate features according to their intermediate migratory behaviour. Our results are congruent with other inter- and intraspecific studies finding similar adaptations for energy-effective flight in relation to migration distance (morphological migratory syndrome). Text Greenland Siberia PubMed Central (PMC) Greenland PLoS ONE 6 4 e18732 |
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Research Article Förschler, Marc I. Bairlein, Franz Morphological Shifts of the External Flight Apparatus across the Range of a Passerine (Northern Wheatear) with Diverging Migratory Behaviour |
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Research Article |
description |
We studied morphological differentiation in the flight apparatus of the four currently recognised sub-species of Northern Wheatears, Oenanthe oenanthe. Considering all measured birds without assigning them a priori to any sub-species we found a clinal morphological shift. Relative wing length, wing pointedness, and the degree of tail forking were positively correlated with migratory distance, whereas tail length (relative to wing length) was negatively correlated. The large-sized, long-distance migrant “Greenland” Wheatear, O. o. leucorhoa, is characterized by relatively longer, broader and more pointed wings and more forked tails, similar to the smaller-sized nominate Northern Wheatear, O. o. oenanthe, from North Europe, Siberia and Russia. In contrast, the short distance migrant “Seebohm's” Wheatear, O. o. seebohmi, from northwest Africa, possesses much rounder wings, and the tail is relatively longer and less forked. Sub-species with intermediate migratory habits (different populations of nominate Northern Wheatear, O. o. oenanthe, and “Mediterranean” Northern Wheatear, O. o. libanotica) show, as expected, intermediate features according to their intermediate migratory behaviour. Our results are congruent with other inter- and intraspecific studies finding similar adaptations for energy-effective flight in relation to migration distance (morphological migratory syndrome). |
format |
Text |
author |
Förschler, Marc I. Bairlein, Franz |
author_facet |
Förschler, Marc I. Bairlein, Franz |
author_sort |
Förschler, Marc I. |
title |
Morphological Shifts of the External Flight Apparatus across the Range of a Passerine (Northern Wheatear) with Diverging Migratory Behaviour |
title_short |
Morphological Shifts of the External Flight Apparatus across the Range of a Passerine (Northern Wheatear) with Diverging Migratory Behaviour |
title_full |
Morphological Shifts of the External Flight Apparatus across the Range of a Passerine (Northern Wheatear) with Diverging Migratory Behaviour |
title_fullStr |
Morphological Shifts of the External Flight Apparatus across the Range of a Passerine (Northern Wheatear) with Diverging Migratory Behaviour |
title_full_unstemmed |
Morphological Shifts of the External Flight Apparatus across the Range of a Passerine (Northern Wheatear) with Diverging Migratory Behaviour |
title_sort |
morphological shifts of the external flight apparatus across the range of a passerine (northern wheatear) with diverging migratory behaviour |
publisher |
Public Library of Science |
publishDate |
2011 |
url |
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3078915 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21533160 https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0018732 |
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Greenland |
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Greenland |
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Greenland Siberia |
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Greenland Siberia |
op_relation |
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3078915 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21533160 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0018732 |
op_rights |
Förschler, Bairlein. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. |
op_rightsnorm |
CC-BY |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0018732 |
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PLoS ONE |
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6 |
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e18732 |
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