Abstract
Intermittent breeding (skipping a breeding season) can be the result of an adaptive decision by a focal individual, trading current reproductive success in favour of future reproductive success (residual reproductive value hypothesis). In contrast, an individual can also be forced by conspecifics to abandon the familiar breeding site and refrain from breeding due to lack of suitable alternative breeding sites or mates (competition hypothesis). I studied intermittent breeding in the territorial and site-faithful Eurasian oystercatcher Haematopus ostralegus, using a dataset covering 20 years. Intermittent breeding (in total 86 cases) occurred among breeders that formerly bred in high- as well as low-quality territories. The main factor associated with intermittent breeding in high-quality sites was death of a mate, while in low quality sites divorce was the most prominent factor. In 93% of the cases birds were forced to cease breeding due to pressure from conspecifics consistent with the competition hypothesis. There was no association between intermittent breeding and promotion to a territory of better quality. Instead, oystercatchers returned to breeding habitat of similar quality and at a very close distance (median distance 128 m) from the previous breeding location. Breeding absences lasted on average 2.4 years, with a maximum of 9 years, and the quality of the territory obtained after the absence varied with the duration of it. Birds who re-bred in a high-quality territory acquired this on average faster than those that re-bred in a low-quality territory, indicating that birds in high-quality sites are better competitors.
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Acknowledgements
Many people were involved in keeping the Schiermonnikoog-oystercatcher population study running over the years and skilled fieldworkers such as Allix Brenninkmeijer, Bruno Ens, Dik Heg, Jan Hulscher, Marcel Kersten, Kees van Oers, Kees Oosterbeek, Martijn van de Pol, and Simon Verhulst were crucial. Natuurmonumenten and especially Otto Overdijk gave us permission and support to carry out our fieldwork on Schiermonnikoog. Joost Tinbergen, Rudi Drent and two anonymous referees improved the manuscript. This publication was financed by a grant from Nwo-alw (90536124), a UCT post-doctoral research grant from the University of Cape Town, and a grant from NRF. Data reported in this study were based on non-invasive observations and the population study (including the marking of animals) was carried out under licence.
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Bruinzeel, L.W. Intermittent breeding as a cost of site fidelity. Behav Ecol Sociobiol 61, 551–556 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00265-006-0283-0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00265-006-0283-0