Zárybnická Markéta, Riegert Jan, Brejšková Lucie, Šindelář Jiří, Kouba Marek, Hanel Jan, Popelková Alena, Menclová Petra, Tomášek Václav, Šťastný Karel
Department of Ecology, Faculty of Environmental Sciences, Czech University of Life Sciences Prague, Prague, Czech Republic.
Department of Zoology, Faculty of Science, University of South Bohemia in České Budějovice, České Budějovice, Czech Republic.
PLoS One. 2015 Oct 7;10(10):e0138177. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0138177. eCollection 2015.
In altricial birds, energy supply during growth is a major predictor of the physical condition and survival prospects of fledglings. A number of experimental studies have shown that nestling body mass and wing length can vary with particular extrinsic factors, but between-year observational data on this topic are scarce. Based on a seven-year observational study in a central European Tengmalm's owl population we examine the effect of year, brood size, hatching order, and sex on nestling body mass and wing length, as well as the effect of prey abundance on parameters of growth curve. We found that nestling body mass varied among years, and parameters of growth curve, i.e. growth rate and inflection point in particular, increased with increasing abundance of the owl's main prey (Apodemus mice, Microtus voles), and pooled prey abundance (Apodemus mice, Microtus voles, and Sorex shrews). Furthermore, nestling body mass varied with hatching order and between sexes being larger for females and for the first-hatched brood mates. Brood size had no effect on nestling body mass. Simultaneously, we found no effect of year, brood size, hatching order, or sex on the wing length of nestlings. Our findings suggest that in this temperate owl population, nestling body mass is more sensitive to prey abundance than is wing length. The latter is probably more limited by the physiology of the species.
在晚成雏鸟类中，生长期间的能量供应是雏鸟身体状况和生存前景的主要预测指标。一些实验研究表明，雏鸟的体重和翅长会因特定的外在因素而有所不同，但关于这一主题的年度间观测数据却很稀少。基于对中欧长尾林鸮种群的一项为期七年的观测研究，我们考察了年份、窝雏数、孵化顺序和性别对雏鸟体重和翅长的影响，以及猎物丰度对生长曲线参数的影响。我们发现，雏鸟体重在不同年份间存在差异，并且生长曲线的参数，特别是生长速率和拐点，会随着猫头鹰主要猎物（姬鼠、田鼠）以及混合猎物（姬鼠、田鼠和鼩鼱）丰度的增加而增加。此外，雏鸟体重随孵化顺序而变化，雌性雏鸟以及第一孵化出的同窝雏鸟体重更大。窝雏数对雏鸟体重没有影响。同时，我们发现年份、窝雏数、孵化顺序或性别对雏鸟的翅长没有影响。我们的研究结果表明，在这个温带猫头鹰种群中，雏鸟体重比翅长对猎物丰度更为敏感。翅长可能更多地受该物种生理特征的限制。
