Partially migratory species provide opportunities to understand which ecological factors cause some animals to migrate when others remain resident year round. Partial migration in birds has been explained by the dominance, arrival-time, and body-size hypotheses. 2. Testing these hypotheses has proven difficult due to the similarities of the predictions they make in temperate-breeding long-distance migrants. In tropical altitudinal migrants, however, these hypotheses make different predictions regarding the sex, age, and condition of migrants and residents. 3. Among white-ruffed manakins in Costa Rica, young birds were not more likely to migrate (as predicted by the dominance hypothesis), nor were females more likely to migrate (as predicted by the arrival-time hypothesis). All condition-related variables interacted with sex, together explaining much of the variation in migratory behaviour. 4. I re-articulate the body-size hypothesis in the context of tropical altitudinal bird migration, focusing explicitly on how limited foraging opportunities and differences in individual condition affect fasting ability during torrential rains. Despite ample food, the smallest birds or those stressed by parasites or moult may risk starvation at breeding elevations due to a reduction in foraging time. These results highlight how intrinsic and extrinsic factors may interact to produce observed patterns of within- and among-species variation in migratory behaviour.
