Timing and body condition of dichromatic Black Redstarts during autumn migration

Ecology and Evolution
Tobias RothThomas Schwaller

Abstract

Individual variation in postjuvenile molt in male Black Redstart is pronounced with about 90% of young males retaining female-like coloration (cairei plumage type) and about 10% acquiring adult male-like feathers (paradoxus plumage type). We examined whether autumn migration timing and body condition differed between individuals of the two plumage types. We used the data of 10,977 Black Redstarts captured during autumn at a ringing site in northern Switzerland where a protocol to record plumage types of captures has been applied since 1980. As cairei individuals cannot be distinguished from young females while sexing is comparatively easy for paradoxus individuals, the proportion of missing data on sex was likely to be higher for cairei individuals than for paradoxus individuals. We formally accounted for captures with unidentified sex using a Bayesian approach and conducted a simulation study to show that our approach was able to provide unbiased results even if the proportion of unsexed captures was high. Applying the method to the Black Redstart data, we found that the proportion of individuals with paradoxus plumage type increased from 7.6% in 1980 to 18.1% in 2013. Individuals with the paradoxus plumage type were on averag...Continue Reading

References

Oct 13, 2006·The Journal of Animal Ecology·Hanna KokkoJennifer A Gill
Jul 28, 2011·Biological Reviews of the Cambridge Philosophical Society·Gerard L HawkinsAustin Mercadante

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