The Development of Bird Migration Theory

Alerstam, Thomas; Hedenström, Anders

doi:10.2307/3677155

Cited by 351 publications

(255 citation statements)

References 161 publications

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“…They apparently rely on an innate orientation program for guidance toward their speciesspecific wintering areas (1), which can apparently steer them very precisely over thousands of kilometers (8). In the absence of guidance by experienced conspecifics, this program is considered of critical importance for juvenile birds to survive the migration and ultimately breed (9).…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Evidence for a navigational map stretching across the continental U.S. in a migratory songbird

Thorup

Bisson

Bowlin

et al. 2007

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

205

191

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Billions of songbirds migrate several thousand kilometers from breeding to wintering grounds and are challenged with crossing ecological barriers and facing displacement by winds along the route. A satisfactory explanation of long-distance animal navigation is still lacking, partly because of limitations on field-based study. The navigational tasks faced by adults and juveniles differ fundamentally, because only adults migrate toward wintering grounds known from the previous year. Here, we show by radio tracking from small aircraft that only adult, and not juvenile, long-distance migrating white-crowned sparrows rapidly recognize and correct for a continent-wide displacement of 3,700 km from the west coast of North America to previously unvisited areas on the east coast. These results show that the learned navigational map used by adult long-distance migratory songbirds extends at least on a continental scale. The juveniles with less experience rely on their innate program to find their distant wintering areas and continue to migrate in the innate direction without correcting for displacement.behavior ͉ bird migration ͉ displacement ͉ orientation ͉ white-crowned sparrow

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mentioning

confidence: 99%

Evidence for a navigational map stretching across the continental U.S. in a migratory songbird

Thorup

Bisson

Bowlin

et al. 2007

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

205

191

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“…Although we recognize that this categorization can be overly simplistic (see, for example, ref. 8) and that other categorizations based on ecological function exist (9)(10), the dichotomy of soaring versus flapping migration can play a useful role in understanding the internal costs of movement, flexibility of migration timing, and the ability to adopt new routes (refs. 1 and 2 and references therein).…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Movement ecology of migration in turkey vultures

Mandel

Bildstein

Bohrer

et al. 2008

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

113

141

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We develop individual-based movement ecology models (MEM) to explore turkey vulture (Cathartes aura) migration decisions at both hourly and daily scales. Vulture movements in 10 migration events were recorded with satellite-reporting GPS sensors, and flight behavior was observed visually, aided by on-the-ground VHF radio-tracking. We used the North American Regional Reanalysis dataset to obtain values for wind speed, turbulent kinetic energy (TKE), and cloud height and used a digital elevation model for a measure of terrain ruggedness. A turkey vulture fitted with a heart-rate logger during 124 h of flight during 38 contiguous days showed only a small increase in mean heart rate as distance traveled per day increased, which suggests that, unlike flapping, soaring flight does not lead to greatly increased metabolic costs. Data from 10 migrations for 724 hourly segments and 152 daily segments showed that vultures depended heavily upon high levels of TKE in the atmospheric boundary layer to increase flight distances and maintain preferred bearings at both hourly and daily scales. We suggest how the MEM can be extended to other spatial and temporal scales of avian migration. Our success in relating model-derived atmospheric variables to migration indicates the potential of using regional reanalysis data, as here, and potentially other regional, higher-resolution, atmospheric models in predicting changing movement patterns of soaring birds under various scenarios of climate and land use change.energetics ͉ flight ͉ meteorology T raditionally, bird migration has been treated separately relative to other movements within an individual's life history (1-2). Although long-distance migration operates on different scales and produces different patterns than those of other movement types in a bird's life cycle, there are also many similarities (cf. ref.3). As in other biotic movements, migration involves the assessment of internal state of the organism, external factors, and past behavior to make decisions about motion and navigation (4).One significant challenge of migration research is measuring the extent to which migratory routes and schedules of individual migrants are influenced by external factors, including wind direction and speed (5-6), food availability and habitat (2), and the behavior of other migrants (1, 7). One important axis of variation among migratory birds is the extent to which environmental factors act as facilitators of, as opposed to barriers to, movement. Determining the effects of environmental factors is particularly important for soaring birds, whose movements rely upon environmental factors such as deflection updrafts and thermal convection as their principle means of propulsion, whereas those using primarily flapping flight are, in principal, not directly dependent on environmental forces for propulsion and lift. Although we recognize that this categorization can be overly simplistic (see, for example, ref. 8) and that other categorizations based on ecological function exist (9-10), the dichoto...

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“…However, understanding movement patterns requires that ringed birds are recovered and when they are only the start and end points of movements can be determined. More recently, radar has been used to quantify migration in space and time, to determine the altitude of migration and to understand the influence of weather conditions on migration (Alerstam and Hedenström, 1998;Bairlein, 2003). For years the tracking of migrating species has proved difficult for all but conspicuous species (Chamberlain et al, 1997;Wassenaar and Hobson, 1998;Hobson, 1999;Wassenaar and Hobson, 2000;Hobson, 2002;Kelly et al, 2002;Rubenstein and Hobson, 2004;Hobson, 2005).…”

Section: Before Stable Isotopesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Stable Isotope Research in Southern African Birds

Symes¹

2012

Diversity of Ecosystems

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The Development of Bird Migration Theory

Cited by 351 publications

References 161 publications

Evidence for a navigational map stretching across the continental U.S. in a migratory songbird

Evidence for a navigational map stretching across the continental U.S. in a migratory songbird

Movement ecology of migration in turkey vultures

Stable Isotope Research in Southern African Birds

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