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Beaulieu Michaël, Ropert-Coudert Yan, Le Maho Yvon, Ancel André, Criscuolo François, . (2010). Foraging in an oxidative environment: relationship between 13C values and oxidative status in Adélie penguins
. Proc. Biol. Sci., 277(1684), 1087–1092.
Abstract: The alternation of short/coastal and long/pelagic foraging trips has been proposed as a strategy for seabirds to reconcile self-feeding and parental care. Both types of foraging trips may result in different foraging efforts and diet qualities, and consequently are likely to modify the oxidative status of seabirds.We examined the relationship between the oxidative status of Adélie penguins and (i) the duration of their foraging trips and (ii) their plasma 13C values reflecting their spatial distribution.The oxidative status did not correlate with the foraging trip duration but with the 13C values: high values being associated with high levels of oxidative damage.This relationship is likely to be related to the prey properties of penguins as both parameters are largely determined by the diet. Two non-exclusive hypotheses can be proposed to explain this relationship: (i) penguins foraging in coastal areas feed on a diet enriched in 13C and depleted in antioxidant compounds; (ii) birds with low antioxidant capacity are constrained to forage in coastal areas.Our study is the first to show that the adoption of different foraging strategies is associated with different levels of oxidative stress. However, further studies are needed to investigate the underlying mechanisms of this intriguing relationship.
Programme: 137
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Leclaire Sarah, Merkling Thomas, Raynaud Christine, Mulard Hervé, Bessière Jean-Marie, Lhuillier Émeline, Hatch Scott A, Danchin Étienne, . (2011). Semiochemical compounds of preen secretion reflect genetic make-up in a seabird species
. Proc. Biol. Sci., .
Abstract: Several vertebrates choose their mate according to genetic heterozygosity and relatedness, and use odour cues to assess their conspecifics' genetic make-up. In birds, although several species (including the black-legged kittiwake) exhibit non-random mating according to genetic traits, the cues used to assess genetic characteristics remain unknown. The importance of olfaction in birds' social behaviour is gaining attention among researchers, and it has been suggested that, as in other vertebrates, bird body scent may convey information about genetic traits. Here, we combined gas chromatography data and genetic analyses at microsatellite loci to test whether semiochemical messages in preen secretion of kittiwakes carried information about genetic heterozygosity and relatedness. Semiochemical profile was correlated with heterozygosity in males and females, while semiochemical distance was correlated with genetic distance only in malemale dyads. Our study is the first to demonstrate a link between odour and genetics in birds, which sets the stage for the existence of sophisticated odour-based mechanisms of mate choice also in birds.
Programme: 1162
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Péron Clara, Weimerskirch Henri, Bost Charles-André, . (2012). Projected poleward shift of king penguins' (Aptenodytes patagonicus) foraging range at the Crozet Islands, southern Indian Ocean
. Proc. Biol. Sci., 279 (1738 ), 2515–2523 .
Abstract: Seabird populations of the Southern Ocean have been responding to climate change for the last three decades and demographic models suggest that projected warming will cause dramatic population changes over the next century. Shift in species distribution is likely to be one of the major possible adaptations to changing environmental conditions. Habitat models based on a unique long-term tracking dataset of king penguin (Aptenodytes patagonicus) breeding on the Crozet Islands (southern Indian Ocean) revealed that despite a significant influence of primary productivity and mesoscale activity, sea surface temperature consistently drove penguins' foraging distribution. According to climate models of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the projected warming of surface waters would lead to a gradual southward shift of the more profitable foraging zones, ranging from 25 km per decade for the B1 IPCC scenario to 40 km per decade for the A1B and A2 scenarios. As a consequence, distances travelled by incubating and brooding birds to reach optimal foraging zones associated with the polar front would double by 2100. Such a shift is far beyond the usual foraging range of king penguins breeding and would negatively affect the Crozet population on the long term, unless penguins develop alternative foraging strategies.
Programme: 109
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Riotte-Lambert Louise, Weimerskirch Henri, . (2013). Do naive juvenile seabirds forage differently from adults?
. Proc. Biol. Sci., 280(1768), 20131434.
Abstract: Foraging skills of young individuals are assumed to be inferior to those of adults. The reduced efficiency of naive individuals may be the primary cause of the high juvenile mortality and explain the deferment of maturity in long-lived species. However, the study of juvenile and immature foraging behaviour has been limited so far. We used satellite telemetry to compare the foraging movements of juveniles, immatures and breeding adult wandering albatrosses Diomedea exulans, a species where foraging success is positively influenced by the distance covered daily. We showed that juveniles are able to use favourable winds as soon as the first month of independence, but cover shorter distances daily and spend more time sitting on water than adults during the first two months after fledging. These reduced movement capacities do not seem to be the cause of higher juvenile mortality. Moreover, juveniles almost never restrict their movement to specific areas, as adults and immatures frequently do over shelf edges or oceanic zones, which suggest that the location of appropriate areas is learned through experience. Immatures and adults have equivalent movement capacities, but when they are central place foragers, i.e. when adults breed or immatures come to the colony to display and pair, immatures make shorter trips than adults. The long duration of immaturity in this species seems to be related to a long period of learning to integrate the foraging constraints associated with reproduction and central place foraging. Our results indicate that foraging behaviour of young albatrosses is partly innate and partly learned progressively over immaturity. The first months of learning appear critical in terms of survival, whereas the long period of immaturity is necessary for young birds to attain the skills necessary for efficient breeding without fitness costs.
Keywords: albatross, immaturity, learning, movement, telemetry,
Programme: 109
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Patrick Samantha C, Weimerskirch Henri, . (2015). Senescence rates and late adulthood reproductive success are strongly influenced by personality in a long-lived seabird.
. Proc. Biol. Sci., 282(1799), 20141649.
Abstract: Studies are increasingly demonstrating that individuals differ in their rate of ageing, and this is postulated to emerge from a trade-off between current and future reproduction. Recent theory predicts a correlation between individual personality and life-history strategy, and from this comes the prediction that personality may predict the intensity of senescence. Here we show that boldness correlates with reproductive success and foraging behaviour in wandering albatrosses, with strong sex-specific differences. Shy males show a strong decline in reproductive performance with age, and bold females have lower reproductive success in later adulthood. In both sexes, bolder birds have longer foraging trips and gain more mass per trip as they get older. However, the benefit of this behaviour appears to differ between the sexes, such that it is only matched by high reproductive success in males. Together our results suggest that personality linked foraging adaptations with age are strongly sex-specific in their fitness benefits and that the impact of boldness on senescence is linked to ecological parameters.
Keywords: Aging, Animals, Behavior, Animal, Birds, Birds: physiology, Feeding Behavior, Female, Life Cycle Stages, Longevity, Male, Reproduction,
Programme: 109
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Fay Rémi, Barbraud Christophe, Delord Karine, Weimerskirch Henri. (2016). Paternal but not maternal age influences early-life performance of offspring in a long-lived seabird. Proc. Biol. Sci., 283(1828), 20152318.
Abstract: Variability in demographic traits between individuals within populations has profound implications for both evolutionary processes and population dynamics. Parental effects as a source of non-genetic inheritance are important processes to consider to understand the causes of individual variation. In iteroparous species, parental age is known to influence strongly reproductive success and offspring quality, but consequences on an offspring fitness component after independence are much less studied. Based on 37 years longitudinal monitoring of a long-lived seabird, the wandering albatross, we investigate delayed effects of parental age on offspring fitness components. We provide evidence that parental age influences offspring performance beyond the age of independence. By distinguishing maternal and paternal age effects, we demonstrate that paternal age, but not maternal age, impacts negatively post-fledging offspring performance.
Programme: 109
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McCoy K.D., Chapuis E., Tirard C., Boulinier T., Michalakis Y., Le Bohec C., Le Maho. (2005). Recurrent evolution of host-specialized races in a globally-distributed parasite. Proc Biol Sci., 272(1579), 2389–2395.
Abstract: The outcome of coevolutionary interactions is predicted to vary across landscapes depending on local conditions and levels of gene flow, with some populations evolving more extreme specializations than others. Using a globally distributed parasite of colonial seabirds, the tick Ixodes uriae, we examined how host availability and geographic isolation influences this process. In particular, we sampled ticks from 30 populations of six different seabird host species, three in the Southern Hemisphere and three in the Northern Hemisphere. We show that parasite races have evolved independently on hosts of both hemispheres. Moreover, the degree of differentiation between tick races varied spatially within each region and suggests that the divergence of tick races is an ongoing process that has occurred multiple times across isolated areas. As I. uriae is vector to the bacterium responsible for Lyme disease Borrelia burgdorferi sensu lato, these results may have important consequence for the epidemiology of this disease. With the increased occurrence of novel interspecific interactions due to global change, these results also stress the importance of the combined effects of gene flow and selection for parasite diversification.
Programme: 333;137
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Traversi, R.; Becagli, S.; Castellano, E.; Cerri, O.; Morganti, A.; Severi, M.; Udisti, R. (2009). Study of Dome C site (East Antartica) variability by comparing chemical stratigraphies. Polar Chemistry, 92(1), 7–14.
Abstract: This paper compares chemical stratigraphies from snowpits collected at Dome C (East Antarctica) in order to assess site variability in terms of spatial distribution of chemical markers, annual accumulation rate and chemical species persistence in the snow layers. Since Dome C was chosen for deep drilling down to the bedrock in the framework of EPICA (European Project for Ice Coring in Antarctica), to provide 800kyr of climatic and environmental records, evaluating site variability is fundamental for a reliable interpretation of the deep ice core stratigraphies.
For this purpose, 4 snowpits were dug at Dome C (1997/98, 1998/99, 2000/01 and 2005/06 Antarctic Campaigns) and analysed for cations, inorganic anions and methane sulphonate by ion chromatography. Unlike the first three snowpits, the most recent one was analysed directly in situ, allowing to observe that no chemical contamination or loss due to sample storage and transport to Europe occurs for such a sampling.
Accumulation rate variability was revealed to be around 4% in a common time range (1992-1964) for all snowpits. Intra-snowpit chemical variability was definitely higher than inter-snowpit variability, indicating that the variations observed in the chemical stratigraphies from Dome C can be reliably related to effective changes in source and transport mechanisms of the investigated markers more than to site variability.
Post-depositional phenomena affecting chloride, nitrate and methane sulphonate were studied, revealing a logarithmic decay as a function of depth for Cl- and MSA and an exponential one for NO3-. The relative losses were quantified in the 75-80% range for Cl-, 66-83% for MSA and 89-94% for NO3- and were found to stop around 320, 320 and 60-80cm depth, respectively.
Keywords: Antarctica; Dome C; Snowpit; Chemical analysis; Post-depositional effects
Programme: 1181
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Ropert Coudert Y., Sato K., Kato A., Charrassin J.B., Bost C.A., Le Maho Y. & Naito Y. (2000). Preliminary investigations of prey pursuit and capture by king penguins at sea. Polar Biosci., 13, 101–112.
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Ropert Coudert Y., Grémillet D. & Kato A. (2005). Diving angles of great cormorants. Polar Biosci., 18, 54–59.
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