Snowy Owls in central North America have regular migration and high philopatry to wintering sites though not always to home ranges

IF 1.4 4区环境科学与生态学 Q3 BIODIVERSITY CONSERVATION

Avian Conservation and Ecology Pub Date : 2023-01-01 DOI:10.5751/ace-02528-180214

Karen Wiebe, Mark Bidwell, Rebecca McCabe

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引用次数: 0

Abstract

Understanding the threats faced by a bird species requires a knowledge of their movements throughout the annual cycle and, for migratory species, the degree of connectivity between breeding and wintering sites. We studied the philopatry of Snowy Owls (Bubo scandiacus) tagged in central North America to their wintering sites on the Canadian prairies. The tracking of 16 owls over a period spanning six winters revealed consistent and predictable north-south migration trajectories, in contrast to populations farther to the west and east. Individuals were strongly philopatric to the central prairie region, but at a finer spatial scale, winter home ranges did not always overlap between successive years. Both sexes showed periods of nomadic searching for prey over a similar spatial scale, but males tended to settle closer to previous home ranges on average (88 km) than females (149 km). We hypothesize that the socially dominant females are better able to monopolize the spatially unpredictable hotspots of small mammal prey whereas males rely more on familiarity with a previous home range when settling. The population of Snowy Owls in central North America thus shows greater connectivity to wintering sites than do Snowy Owls documented elsewhere, probably related to the relatively high abundance and predictability of small mammal prey on the prairies. Maintaining prairie habitat on a large spatial scale that supports small rodents will be crucial to maintaining populations of Snowy Owls in the central part of the continent.

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北美中部的雪鸮有规律的迁徙和高度的philality到越冬地点，尽管并不总是回到家乡

要了解鸟类面临的威胁，需要了解它们在整个年周期中的活动情况，对于候鸟来说，还需要了解繁殖地和越冬地之间的连通性程度。我们研究了雪鸮(Bubo scandiacus)在北美中部被标记到它们在加拿大大草原上的越冬地点的哲学。通过对16只猫头鹰长达6个冬天的追踪，研究人员揭示了它们一贯的、可预测的南北迁徙轨迹，这与它们向东和向西迁徙的轨迹形成了鲜明对比。个体对中部草原地区具有强烈的亲缘性，但在更精细的空间尺度上，冬季栖息地在连续年份之间并不总是重叠的。两性都表现出在相似的空间尺度上寻找猎物的游牧时期，但男性倾向于在平均距离(88公里)比女性(149公里)更接近以前的家园范围定居。我们假设，社会优势的雌性能够更好地垄断空间上不可预测的小型哺乳动物猎物热点，而雄性在定居时更多地依赖于对以前家园范围的熟悉。因此，北美中部的雪鸮种群比其他地方记录的雪鸮与越冬地点的联系更紧密，这可能与草原上相对丰富和可预测的小型哺乳动物猎物有关。在大的空间尺度上维持草原栖息地，以支持小型啮齿动物，对于维持大陆中部雪鸮的种群至关重要。

本文章由计算机程序翻译，如有差异，请以英文原文为准。

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来源期刊

Avian Conservation and Ecology BIODIVERSITY CONSERVATION-ORNITHOLOGY

CiteScore

2.20

自引率

7.10%

发文量

审稿时长

>12 weeks

期刊介绍： Avian Conservation and Ecology is an open-access, fully electronic scientific journal, sponsored by the Society of Canadian Ornithologists and Birds Canada. We publish papers that are scientifically rigorous and relevant to the bird conservation community in a cost-effective electronic approach that makes them freely available to scientists and the public in real-time. ACE is a fully indexed ISSN journal that welcomes contributions from scientists all over the world. While the name of the journal implies a publication niche of conservation AND ecology, we think the theme of conservation THROUGH ecology provides a better sense of our purpose. As such, we are particularly interested in contributions that use a scientifically sound and rigorous approach to the achievement of avian conservation as revealed through insights into ecological principles and processes. Papers are expected to fall along a continuum of pure conservation and management at one end to more pure ecology at the other but our emphasis will be on those contributions with direct relevance to conservation objectives.