Department of Genetics, Evolution and Environment, Centre for Biodiversity and Environment Research, University College London, London, UK.
Department of Biology, Colorado State University, Fort Collins, Colorado, USA.
Ecol Lett. 2024 Aug;27(8):e14496. doi: 10.1111/ele.14496.
Tracking climatic conditions throughout the year is often assumed to be an adaptive behaviour underlying seasonal migration patterns in animal populations. We investigate this hypothesis using genetic markers data to map migratory connectivity for 27 genetically distinct bird populations from 7 species. We found that the variation in seasonal climate tracking across our suite of populations at a continental scale is more likely a consequence, rather than a direct driver, of migratory connectivity, which is primarily shaped by energy efficiency-i.e., optimizing the balance between accessing available resources and movement costs. However, our results also suggest that regional-scale seasonal precipitation tracking affects population migration destinations, thus revealing a potential scale dependency of ecological processes driving migration. Our results have implications for the conservation of these migratory species under climate change, as populations tracking climate seasonally are potentially at higher risk if they adapt to a narrow range of climatic conditions.
跟踪全年的气候条件通常被认为是动物种群季节性迁徙模式的基础适应性行为。我们使用遗传标记数据来研究这个假说，以绘制来自 7 个物种的 27 个具有遗传差异的鸟类种群的迁徙连通性。我们发现，在我们的大陆尺度种群中，季节性气候跟踪的变化更可能是迁徙连通性的结果，而不是直接驱动因素，迁徙连通性主要由能量效率决定，即优化获取可用资源和移动成本之间的平衡。然而，我们的结果也表明，区域尺度季节性降水跟踪会影响种群的迁徙目的地，从而揭示了驱动迁徙的生态过程的潜在尺度依赖性。我们的研究结果对这些迁徙物种在气候变化下的保护具有重要意义，因为如果它们适应狭窄的气候条件，季节性跟踪气候的种群可能面临更高的风险。
