Jennifer A. Border
Spatial variation in spring arrival patterns of Afro‐Palaearctic bird migration across Europe
Border, Jennifer A.; Boersch‐Supan, Philipp H.; Pearce‐Higgins, James W.; Hewson, Chris M.; Howard, Christine; Stephens, Philip A.; Willis, Stephen G.; Houston, Alasdair I.; Gargallo, Gabriel; Baillie, Stephen R.
Authors
Philipp H. Boersch‐Supan
James W. Pearce‐Higgins
Chris M. Hewson
Dr Christine Howard christine.howard@durham.ac.uk
Assistant Professor
Professor Philip Stephens philip.stephens@durham.ac.uk
Professor
Professor Stephen Willis s.g.willis@durham.ac.uk
Professor
Alasdair I. Houston
Gabriel Gargallo
Stephen R. Baillie
Abstract
Aim: Geographical patterns of migrant species arrival have been little studied, despite their relevance to global change responses. Here, we quantify continent-wide inter-specific variation in spatio-temporal patterns of spring arrival of 30 common migrant bird species and relate these to species characteristics and environmental conditions.
Location: Europe
Time period: 2010-2019
Major taxa studied: Birds, 30 species
Methods: Using citizen science data from EuroBirdPortal, we modelled arrival phenology for 30 Afro-Palearctic migrant species across Europe to extract start and duration of species arrival at a 400 km square resolution. We related inter and intra-specific variation in arrival and duration to species characteristics and temperature at the start of the growing season (green-up) .
Results: Spatial variation in start of arrival times indicates it took on average 1.6 days for the leading migratory front to move northwards by 100 km (range: 0.6—2.5 days). There was a major gradient in arrival phenology, from species which arrived earlier, least synchronously, in colder temperatures and progressed slowly northwards to species which arrived later, most synchronously and in warmer temperatures, and advanced quickly through Europe. The slow progress of early arrivers suggests that temperature limits their northward advance; this group included Aerial Insectivores and species wintering north of the Sahel. For the late arrivers, which included species wintering further south, seasonal resource availability in Africa may delay their arrival into Europe.
Main conclusions: We found support for the green-wave hypothesis applying widely to migratory landbirds. Species arrival phenologies are linked to ecological differences between taxa, such as diet, and wintering location. Understanding these differences informs predictions of species’ sensitivity to global change. Publishing these arrival phenologies will facilitate further research and have additional conservation benefits such as informing designation of hunting seasons. Our methods are applicable to any taxa with repeated occurrence data across large scales.
Key words: phenology, European-African migrants, bird migration, spring arrival, spatial variation, intraspecific and interspecific variation, EuroBirdPortal, citizen scientists, complete lists and casual records
Citation
Border, J. A., Boersch‐Supan, P. H., Pearce‐Higgins, J. W., Hewson, C. M., Howard, C., Stephens, P. A., Willis, S. G., Houston, A. I., Gargallo, G., & Baillie, S. R. (2024). Spatial variation in spring arrival patterns of Afro‐Palaearctic bird migration across Europe. Global Ecology and Biogeography, 33(7), Article e13850. https://doi.org/10.1111/geb.13850
Journal Article Type | Article |
---|---|
Acceptance Date | Apr 16, 2024 |
Online Publication Date | May 2, 2024 |
Publication Date | May 2, 2024 |
Deposit Date | May 10, 2024 |
Publicly Available Date | May 13, 2024 |
Journal | Global Ecology and Biogeography |
Print ISSN | 1466-822X |
Electronic ISSN | 1466-8238 |
Publisher | Wiley |
Peer Reviewed | Peer Reviewed |
Volume | 33 |
Issue | 7 |
Article Number | e13850 |
DOI | https://doi.org/10.1111/geb.13850 |
Public URL | https://durham-repository.worktribe.com/output/2436175 |
Publisher URL | https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/geb.13850 |
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Licence
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Copyright Statement
This accepted manuscript is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 licence. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
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