Migrant birds and mammals live faster than residents

Andrea Soriano-Redondo, Jorge S. Gutiérrez, Dave Hodgson () and Stuart Bearhop ()
Additional contact information
Andrea Soriano-Redondo: University of Exeter
Jorge S. Gutiérrez: University of Extremadura
Dave Hodgson: University of Exeter
Stuart Bearhop: University of Exeter

Nature Communications, 2020, vol. 11, issue 1, 1-8

Abstract: Abstract Billions of vertebrates migrate to and from their breeding grounds annually, exhibiting astonishing feats of endurance. Many such movements are energetically costly yet there is little consensus on whether or how such costs might influence schedules of survival and reproduction in migratory animals. Here we provide a global analysis of associations between migratory behaviour and vertebrate life histories. After controlling for latitudinal and evolutionary patterns, we find that migratory birds and mammals have faster paces of life than their non-migratory relatives. Among swimming and walking species, migrants tend to have larger body size, while among flying species, migrants are smaller. We discuss whether pace of life is a determinant, consequence, or adaptive outcome, of migration. Our findings have important implications for the understanding of the migratory phenomenon and will help predict the responses of bird and mammal species to environmental change.

Date: 2020
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-19256-0 Abstract (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nat:natcom:v:11:y:2020:i:1:d:10.1038_s41467-020-19256-0

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/ncomms/

DOI: 10.1038/s41467-020-19256-0

Access Statistics for this article

Nature Communications is currently edited by Nathalie Le Bot, Enda Bergin and Fiona Gillespie

More articles in Nature Communications from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().