https://phaidra.vetmeduni.ac.at/o:2195 Co-migration fidelity at a stopover site increases over time in African-European migratory landbirds Bellisario, Bruno Bruno Bellisario University of Tuscia Carere, Claudio Claudio Carere 0000-0003-1644-2113 University of Tuscia Fusani, Leonida Leonida Fusani 0000-0001-8900-796X University of Veterinary Medicine Vienna / University of Vienna Cardinale, Massimiliano Massimiliano Cardinale 0000-0003-1870-3882 Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences Maggini, Ivan Ivan Maggini 0000-0002-1528-2288 University of Veterinary Medicine Vienna Royal Society Publishing text eng Migratory species are changing their timing of departure from wintering areas and arrival to breeding sites (i.e. migration phenology) in response to climate change to exploit maximum food availability at higher latitudes and improve their fitness. Despite the impact of changing migration phenology at population and community level, the extent to which individual and species-specific response affects associations among co-migrating species has been seldom explored. By applying temporal co-occurrence network models on 15 years of standardized bird ringing data at a spring stopover site, we show that African-European migratory landbirds tend to migrate in well-defined groups of species with high temporal overlap. Such 'co-migration fidelity' significantly increased over the years and was higher in long-distance (trans-Saharan) than in short-distance (North African) migrants. Our findings suggest non-random patterns of associations in co-migrating species, possibly related to the existence of regulatory mechanisms associated with changing climate conditions and different uses of stopover sites, ultimately influencing the global economy of migration of landbirds in the Palearctic-African migration system. Spring Migration; Climate-Change; Nocturnal Restlessness; Arrival; Consequences; Variability; Consistency; Strategies; Phenology; Quarters http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ https://phaidra.vetmeduni.ac.at/api/object/o:2195/download 10.1098/rsos.221043 https://phaidra.vetmeduni.ac.at/o:605 application/pdf Royal Society Open Science 10(8) (2023) Royal Society Open Science 10 8 3.23 MB 2023