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Title (eng)
Dataset for "Passerine stopover physiology: weather variability does not alter corticosterone dynamics after sea crossing."
Author
Erica Calabretta
Abstract (eng)
Migration is an energy-intensive phase of birds’ life cycle, often including the crossing of large ecological barriers during non-stop flights. Corticosterone (CORT), an adrenocortical hormone also known as the stress hormone, generally rises at the onset of migration to facilitate and sustain high-energy metabolism. Although birds can select favourable meteorological conditions at departure, weather variability en route may affect the migrants' energy reserves and their ability to cope with other stressors. This study investigated the effects of weather conditions on the physiological status of two nocturnal trans-Saharan species, the Common Whitethroat (Curruca communis) and the Garden Warbler (Sylvia borin), upon arrival at a stopover island after crossing the Mediterranean Sea during pre-breeding migration. We assessed fuel stores and CORT variations in relation to tailwinds and air temperature experienced over the sea route. Birds that arrived at the stopover site with residual energy reserves after encountering moderate headwinds or lower temperatures had similar baseline CORT concentrations compared to those that migrated with tailwinds and higher temperatures. While both species exhibited a normal stress response to catching and handling, stress-induced CORT levels were correlated with higher temperature only in Garden Warblers. Our study provides novel insights into CORT dynamics suggesting that nocturnal migratory Passerines are not largely affected by weather variability across a marine barrier during pre-breeding migration if they have sufficient energy reserves.
Description (eng)
This csv file contains physiological, meteorological and phenological data collected and analysed for the research paper titled "Passerine stopover physiology: weather variability does not alter corticosterone dynamics after sea crossing", DOI: 10.1002/jav.03474. Weather data ("temp" = "air temperature", "tailwind", and "crosswind") were an average of nocturnal conditions (from 00 am to 06 am) recorded over the Mediterranean route towards the stopover island of Ponza, and were selected for three pressure levels from the sea surface (1000 mb), to ~ 700 m elevation (925 mb), up to ~ 1500 m elevation (850 mb). Physiological and ringing data on migratory birds were collected on the stopover island of Ponza. Based on the euring.org, Bairlein 1995, fat and muscle (msc) were measured (with ascending values from 0 to 3 for muscle score and from 0 to 8 for fat score), as well as mass (mss), and leght of the third primary (Tert). The ‘scaled mass index’ (SMI), also called ‘Peig Index’ (Peig and Green 2009), was calculated as correction of body mass by body size as a proxy for the residual energy reserves of birds at arrival. "Tert mean" was the average length of the eighth primaries of the species (calculated from more than 50 thousand individuals for each studied species, measured in Ponza in the last 20 years; Ferretti et al. 2019, Maggini et al. 2020), and "slope b" was the scaling exponent computed from the standardised major axis of the regression of body mass on the eighth primary length. "Baseline" and "stress-induced" corticosterone concentrations were measured through blood sampling at nets applying the the standard stress-restraint protocol (Wingfield et al. 1998, Romero and Reed 2005, Fusani et al. 2009). Phenological data were the "temporal parameters" of the bird' capture and blood sampling: "JDays" = "Julian Days" (January 1st = 1), "month", "year", "hour", "timepast" (time elapsed (in minutes) between sunrise and the exact time the bird was trapped), "TrpT" = trapping time, "TC0" = time of baseline sampling, "TC30" = time of stress induced sampling, "ET" = elapsed time between the capture of the bird and the end of data collection.
Keywords (eng)
migratory birdsmigration physiologymigration ecologyweather conditionstailwindtemperatureecological barriertrans-Saharan birdsenergy reservesscaled mass indexpeig index
Type (eng)
dataset
Language
[eng]
Persistent identifier
https://phaidra.vetmeduni.ac.at/o:4201
Is in series
Title
Passerine stopover physiology: weather variability does not alter corticosterone dynamics after sea crossing
DOI
10.1002/jav.03474
License
CC BY 4.0 International