Year: 2024
Type: article
Abstract: Movement is a key means by which animals cope with variable environments. As they move, animals construct individual niches composed of the environmental conditions they experience. Niche axes may vary over time and covary with one another as animals make tradeoffs between competing needs. Seasonal migration is expected to produce substantial niche variation as animals move to keep pace with major life history phases and fluctuations in environmental conditions. Here, we apply a time-ordered principal component analysis to examine dynamic niche variance and covariance across the annual cycle for four species of migratory crane: common crane ( Grus grus , n = 20), demoiselle crane ( Anthropoides virgo , n = 66), black-necked crane ( Grus nigricollis , n = 9), and white-naped crane ( Grus vipio , n = 9). We consider four key niche components known to be important to aspects of crane natural history: enhanced vegetation index (resources availability), temperature (thermoregulation), crop proportion (preferred foraging habitat), and proximity to water (predator avoidance). All species showed a primary seasonal niche “rhythm” that dominated variance in niche components across the annual cycle. Secondary rhythms were linked to major species-specific life history phases (migration, breeding, and nonbreeding) as well as seasonal environmental patterns. Furthermore, we found that cranes’ experiences of the environment emerge from time-dynamic tradeoffs among niche components. We suggest that our approach to estimating the environmental niche as a multidimensional and time-dynamical system of tradeoffs improves mechanistic understanding of organism–environment interactions.
Authors: Scott W. Yanco, Ruth Y. Oliver, Fabiola Iannarilli, Ben S. Carlson, Georg Heine, Uschi Mueller, Nina Richter, Bernd Vorneweg, Yuriy Andryushchenko, Nyambayar Batbayar, Mindaugas Dagys, Mark Desholm, Batbayar Galtbalt, Andrey E. Gavrilov, Oleg A. Goroshko, Elena I. Ilyashenko, Valentin Yu Ilyashenko, Johan Månsson, Elena A. Mudrik, Tseveenmyadag Natsagdorj, Lovisa Nilsson, Sherub Sherub, Henrik Skov, Tuvshintugs Sukhbaatar, Ramunas Zydelis, Martin Wikelski, Walter Jetz, Ivan Pokrovsky
Institutions: Yale University, University of California, Santa Barbara, Max Planck Institute of Animal Behavior, National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, I.I. Schmalhausen Institute of Zoology, Wildlife Science and Conservation Center of Mongolia, Nature Research Centre, Institute of Zoology, Ministry of Science and Higher Education of the Republic of Kazakhstan, Russian Academy of Sciences, Institute of Natural Resources, Ecology and Cryology, Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Severtsov Institute of Ecology and Evolution, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Vavilov Institute of General Genetics, DHI, University of Konstanz
Language: English
Topic: Avian ecology and behavior
Subfield: Ecology
Field: Environmental Science
Domain: Physical Sciences
Open Access status: hybrid
Funders: National Aeronautics and Space Administration, Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, Yale University, California Institute of Technology, International Crane Foundation, Russian Foundation for Basic Research, Siberian Branch, Russian Academy of Sciences, Ministry of Environment, Nuclear Safety and Security Commission, Max-Planck-Gesellschaft, Sveriges Lantbruksuniversitet, Universität Konstanz, Nature, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Russian Academy of Sciences
Awards: THE OVERALL GOAL OF THIS PROPOSAL IS TO USE REMOTE SENSING AND ANIMAL TRACKING DATA TO ASSESS ORGANISMAL RESPONSES TO THE ENVIRONMENT AT THE LEVEL OF THE INDIVIDUAL (HEREAFTER: ENVIRONMENTAL SPECIALIZATION) TO 1) UNDERSTAND THE AMOUNT OF VARIATION PRESENT WITHIN POPULATIONS AND 2) INVESTIGATE UNDERLYING CAUSES FOR THIS VARIATION. MUCH OF OUR UNDERSTANDING OF HOW GLOBAL CHANGE IMPACTS BIODIVERSITY RESTS ON EVIDENCE AT THE SPECIES LEVEL AND IS SURPRISINGLY LIMITED ABOUT WITHIN SPECIES PATTERNS AND PROCESSES. THIS IS ESPECIALLY TRUE FOR SPATIAL BIODIVERSITY PREDICTIONS WHICH OFTEN RELY ON SPECIES DISTRIBUTION MODELS (SDM). GROWING EVIDENCE NOW SHOWS THAT POPULATIONS HARBOR SIGNIFICANT VARIATION AT THE INDIVIDUAL LEVEL WHICH IMPACTS FUNDAMENTAL ECOLOGICAL PROCESSES SUCH AS POPULATION GROWTH RATES AND OUTCOMES OF COMPETITION. THE INCREASING AVAILABILITY OF REMOTELY-SENSED ENVIRONMENTAL VARIABLES IN COMBINATION WITH AGGREGATED GPS ANIMAL TRACKING DATASETS NOW PROVIDE A UNIQUE OPPORTUNITY TO QUANTIFY THIS VARIATION FOR MANY SPECIES ACROSS THEIR GEOGRAPHIC RANGES. MY FIRST AIM IS TO USE REMOTELY-SENSED ENVIRONMENTAL TIME-SERIES VARIABLES AND GPS ANIMAL TRACKING DATA TO ASSESS ENVIRONMENTAL SPECIALIZATION FROM TWELVE SPECIES OF WADING BIRDS WATERFOWL AND RAPTORS USING DATA FROM 247 BIRD POPULATIONS (3 694 INDIVIDUALS). I WILL USE EXISTING AND DERIVED TIME-SERIES VARIABLES SUCH AS LAND COVER FOREST LOSS SEASONAL WATER AVAILABILITY AND ANTHROPOGENIC RESOURCES FROM MODIS LANDSAT AND OTHER SOURCES TO CAPTURE INDIVIDUAL-LEVEL ENVIRONMENTAL NICHES. AGGREGATING INDIVIDUAL NICHES INTO POPULATION LEVEL METRICS WILL ALLOW ME TO DESCRIBE PATTERNS OF ENVIRONMENTAL SPECIALIZATION WITHIN POPULATIONS. MY SECOND AIM IS TO INVESTIGATE HYPOTHESIZED DRIVERS OF ENVIRONMENTAL SPECIALIZATION. I WILL INVESTIGATE WHICH REMOTELY-SENSED VARIABLES ARE MOST ASSOCIATED WITH ENVIRONMENTAL SPECIALIZATION RANGING FROM RELATIVELY STABLE CLIMATE VARIABLES TO DYNAMIC VEGETATION INDICES AS WELL AS DRIVERS OF SPECIALIZATION WITHIN POPULATIONS (E.G. COMPETITION FORAGING EXPERIENCE) AND AMONG POPULATIONS (E.G. LANDSCAPELEVEL HABITAT HETEROGENEITY PRODUCTIVITY). FINALLY I WILL TEST WHETHER SPECIES LIFE-HISTORY TRAITS SUCH AS BEING A HABITAT SPECIALIST OR A GENERALIST IS ASSOCIATED WITH THE DEGREE OF ENVIRONMENTAL SPECIALIZATION. THIS RESEARCH ALIGNS WITH NASA'S EARTH SCIENCE RESEARCH PROGRAM'S CARBON CYCLE AND ECOSYSTEMS GOAL TO "DETECT AND PREDICT CHANGES IN EARTH'S ECOLOGICAL AND BIOGEOCHEMICAL CYCLES INCLUDING LAND COVER BIODIVERSITY AND THE GLOBAL CARBON CYCLE". GEO-BON A MULTI-NATIONAL ORGANIZATION WHOSE GOAL IS TO MONITOR GLOBAL BIODIVERSITY CHANGE RECOGNIZES THAT MONITORING SPECIES DISTRIBUTIONS IS CRITICAL IN THIS EFFORT. SPECIES RESPOND TO ENVIRONMENTAL FACTORS THAT ARE READILY MEASURED BY REMOTE SENSING BUT INTRASPECIFIC VARIATION MEDIATES THESE RESPONSES. THUS THE ABILITY TO ACCURATELY DETECT AND PREDICT BIODIVERSITY CHANGE-ONE OF NASA'S GOALS-DEPENDS ON UNDERSTANDING THE DEGREE OF ENVIRONMENTAL SPECIALIZATION PRESENT WITHIN POPULATIONS AS WELL AS THE UNDERLYING CAUSES OF THIS SPECIALIZATION. I EXPECT THAT MY PROPOSED RESEARCH WILL LEAD TO A BETTER UNDERSTANDING OF THE SPATIOTEMPORAL RESPONSE OF MOBILE ORGANISMS TO FINEGRAINED ENVIRONMENTAL VARIABLES. MY FINDINGS WILL PROVIDE A LARGE-SCALE MULTI-SPECIES ASSESSMENT OF ENVIRONMENTAL SPECIALIZATION AND MAY CHALLENGE THE RESULTS OF PRIOR STUDIES THAT PERFORM SDM AND ITS ASSUMPTION OF STATIC SPECIES-LEVEL NICHES. MY RESEARCH WILL ADVANCE ECOLOGICAL KNOWLEDGE BY TESTING SEVERAL HYPOTHESIZED DRIVERS OF THE UNDERLYING CAUSES OF INDIVIDUAL-LEVEL VARIATION KNOWLEDGE THAT IS VALUABLE FOR PREDICTING BIODIVERSITY RESPONSES TO GLOBAL CHANGE. FINALLY MY RESEARCH WILL DEMONSTRATE HOW TO LEVERAGE INCREASINGLY UBIQUITOUS REMOTE-SENSING AND ANIMAL TRACKING DATA TO INTEGRATE INTRASPECIFIC VARIATION INTO BIODIVERSITY MONITORING AND GLOBAL CHANGE STUDIES, An Integrated Approach to Tracking the Movement of Animals, G3830691927, G5395872271
OpenAlex ID: W4402816136