Interspecific aggression by the Swainson's Thrush (<i>Catharus ustulatus</i>) may limit the distribution of the threatened Bicknell's Thrush (<i>Catharus bicknelli</i>) in the Adirondack Mountains

Freeman, Benjamin G.; Montgomery, Graham A.

doi:10.1650/condor-15-145.1

Cited by 38 publications

(39 citation statements)

References 29 publications

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“…Habitat Partitioning and Coexistence The altitudinal replacements examples (above) illustrate how aggressive interference could foster coexistence between species on a regional scale where, in the absence of interference, one species might expand its niche and drive the other extinct [17][18][19]. Similar outcomes are possible on a finer geographic scale when habitats occur in a mosaic of low-and high-quality patches.…”

Section: Behavioral Interference In Competition Experimentsmentioning

confidence: 93%

Section: Behavioral Interference In Competition Experimentsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Some of the best-studied cases involve species that are currently expanding their range and displacing a congener [13][14][15][16]. A growing body of evidence suggests that behavioral interference also places constraints on geographical ranges and population sizes, for example in altitudinal and latitudinal replacement zones [17][18][19]. …”

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confidence: 99%

“…Mismatches of fundamental versus realized altitudinal distributions provide indirect evidence of behavioral interference, and greater mismatch in one species suggests that aggressive interactions are asymmetrical [47]. These scenarios raise the prospect under climate change of subordinate high-elevation species being squeezed into extinction if dominant low-elevation species shift upslope, or of dominant highelevation species preventing the upward movement of subordinate species, which are then left occupying a physiologically suboptimal habitat [17,19].As well as limiting ranges, behavioral interference has been implicated in some ongoing species replacements [4,7,15,48,49]. Aggressive interference in conjunction with habitat changes appears to account for the cyclical replacement of mountain bluebirds (Sialia currucoides) by western bluebirds (Sialia mexicana) in the northwestern USA [15].…”

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confidence: 99%

“…For example, in Australia, the native hyperaggressive noisy miner (Manorina melanocephala) attacks most other birds. The resultant population declines of other species led to M. melanocephala being identified as a reverse keystone species by virtue of its subcontinental-scale effect on entire avifauna assemblages [55][56][57].Habitat Partitioning and Coexistence The altitudinal replacements examples (above) illustrate how aggressive interference could foster coexistence between species on a regional scale where, in the absence of interference, one species might expand its niche and drive the other extinct [17][18][19]. Similar outcomes are possible on a finer geographic scale when habitats occur in a mosaic of low-and high-quality patches.…”

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confidence: 99%

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Causes and Consequences of Behavioral Interference between Species

Grether

Peiman

Tobias

et al. 2017

Trends in Ecology & Evolution

131

162

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Behavioral interference between species, such as territorial aggression, courtship, and mating, is widespread in animals. While aggressive and reproductive forms of interspecific interference have generally been studied separately, their many parallels and connections warrant a unified conceptual approach. Substantial evidence exists that aggressive and reproductive interference have pervasive effects on species coexistence, range limits, and evolutionary processes, including divergent and convergent forms of character displacement. Alien species invasions and climate change-induced range shifts result in novel interspecific interactions, heightening the importance of predicting the consequences of species interactions, and behavioral interference is a fundamental but neglected part of the equation. Here, we outline priorities for further theoretical and empirical research on the ecological and evolutionary consequences of behavioral interference. Interspecific Aggression and Reproductive InterferenceFew subjects in animal behavior have attracted more attention than aggression and sex, yet research tends to stop at species boundaries even when the behaviors themselves do not. Aggressive and sexual interactions between species are surprisingly common and share many parallels in their causes and ecological and evolutionary effects [1][2][3][4][5][6]. Both types of behavioral interference (Box 1) have been hypothesized to: (i) arise as a byproduct of intraspecific interactions (Box 2); (ii) cause local extinction as well as temporal and spatial habitat partitioning; (iii) prevent species from coexisting that otherwise would be expected to coexist; (iv) enable coexistence between species that otherwise would not be expected to coexist; (v) promote or prevent species range shifts and the spread of invasive species; (vi) cause sympatric species to diverge or converge through character displacement processes; (vii) cause populations within a species to diverge from each other due to character displacement in areas of sympatry; and (viii) contribute to reproductive isolation and speciation ( Figure 1).Despite their connections, aggressive interference and reproductive interference (see Glossary) have largely been studied by different researchers in relation to different theoretical frameworks [2,4,7] and in different study systems [3], even though many closely related species interfere with each other in both ways (see Table S1 in [8]). We do not believe that these two categories of interspecific interactions should be synonymized, because this would obscure important differences between them. Instead, we propose that their similarities and interrelationships merit a common conceptual framework, which we introduce here ( Figure 1). TrendsAggressive and reproductive forms of behavioral interference between species are widespread in animals and share many parallels in their underlying causes and their ecological and evolutionary effects.Behavioral interference can determine whether species coexist and, thus, affects speci...

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Section: Behavioral Interference In Competition Experimentsmentioning

confidence: 93%

Section: Behavioral Interference In Competition Experimentsmentioning

confidence: 99%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Causes and Consequences of Behavioral Interference between Species

Grether

Peiman

Tobias

et al. 2017

Trends in Ecology & Evolution

131

162

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Factors affecting the nesting success of Swainson's Thrush (Catharus ustulatus) along an elevational gradient

Deckel,

DeLuca,

Gerson

et al. 2024

Ecology and Evolution

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Montane birds experience a range of challenges that may limit their breeding success, including nest predation and severe climactic conditions. The continuing effects of climate change are causing shifts in biotic and abiotic factors that may compound these threats to montane bird species. In northeastern montane forests, many bird species are shifting downslope, potentially as the result of increased precipitation and temperature at higher elevations. Although lower elevations might be more favorable in terms of climactic conditions, nest predation is higher at lower elevations. Thus, montane birds might be faced with the opposing pressures of adverse climactic conditions at higher elevations and increased predation at lower elevations. We monitored nests of Swainson's Thrush (Catharus ustulatus) along an elevation gradient in the White Mountain National Forest in New Hampshire in 2016, 2018, 2019, and 2021 to examine the effect of biotic and abiotic factors on daily nest survival rate (DSR). Linear time explained the most variation of DSR in AICc model comparison, indicating that DSR decreases across the breeding season. Rain intensity (mm/h) had a weak negative effect on DSR, indicating that heavier rain per hour decreases Swainson's Thrush DSR. Moreover, we found some support for a negative interaction effect of elevation in conjunction with minimum daily temperature: DSR of Swainson's Thrush nests at low elevations (281 m) increased with increasing minimum daily temperatures and decreased at high elevations with increasing minimum daily temperatures. Our results suggest nesting survival of montane breeding birds may be at risk as heavier precipitation events become more frequent and intense due to the changing climate and raises the possibility that other passerine species could be at risk in this system.

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Species partitioning in a temperate mountain chain: Segregation by habitat vs. interspecific competition

Bastianelli

Wintle

Martin

et al. 2017

Ecology and Evolution

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Disentangling the relative influence of the environment and biotic interactions in determining species coexistence patterns is a major challenge in ecology. The zonation occurring along elevation gradients, or at bioclimatic contact zones, offers a good opportunity to improve such understanding because the small scale at which the partitioning occurs facilitates inference based on experiments and ecological modelling. We studied the influence of abiotic gradients, habitat types, and interspecific competition in determining the spatial turnover between two pipit and two bunting species in NW Spain. We explored two independent lines of evidence to draw inference about the relative importance of environment and biotic interactions in driving range partitioning along elevation, latitude, and longitude. We combined occurrence data with environmental data to develop joint species distribution models (JSDM), in order to attribute co‐occurrence (or exclusion) to shared (or divergent) environmental responses and to interactions (attraction or exclusion). In the same region, we tested for interference competition by means of playback experiments in the contact zone. The JSDMs highlighted different responses for the two species pairs, although we did not find direct evidence of interspecific aggressiveness in our playback experiments. In pipits, partitioning was explained by divergent climate and habitat requirements and also by the negative correlations between species not explained by the environment. This significant residual correlation may reflect forms of competition others than direct interference, although we could not completely exclude the influence of unmeasured environmental predictors. When bunting species co‐occurred, it was because of shared habitat preferences, and a possible limitation to dispersal might cause their partitioning. Our results indicate that no single mechanism dominates in driving the distribution of our study species, but rather distributions are determined by the combination of many small forces including biotic and abiotic determinants of niche, whose relative strengths varied among species.

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Interspecific aggression by the Swainson's Thrush (Catharus ustulatus) may limit the distribution of the threatened Bicknell's Thrush (Catharus bicknelli) in the Adirondack Mountains

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Cited by 38 publications

References 29 publications

Causes and Consequences of Behavioral Interference between Species

Causes and Consequences of Behavioral Interference between Species

Factors affecting the nesting success of Swainson's Thrush (Catharus ustulatus) along an elevational gradient

Species partitioning in a temperate mountain chain: Segregation by habitat vs. interspecific competition

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