Siblicide, starvation and nestling growth in the laughing kookaburra

dc.contributor.authorLegge, Sarah
dc.date.accessioned2015-12-13T22:25:20Z
dc.date.available2015-12-13T22:25:20Z
dc.date.issued2002
dc.date.updated2015-12-11T08:15:02Z
dc.description.abstractI examined the growth of surviving nestlings in broods of the cooperatively breeding laughing kookaburra Dacelo novaeguineae, which has complex patterns of brood reduction. Laughing kookaburras usually lay three eggs that hatch asynchronously. Brood reduction occurs in nearly half of all broods and always affects the youngest nestling. In most cases, the youngest nestling is killed within a few days of hatching by aggressive attacks from its older siblings. In a smaller proportion of nests, the youngest nestling dies from starvation, rather than physical attack, much later in the nestling period when nestling growth rates and adult feeding rates peak (about 20 days post-hatching). These mechanistically and temporally distinct episodes of brood reduction were associated with very different patterns of growth in the senior nestlings. Seniors that killed their youngest sibling reached higher asymptotic weights than seniors that did not commit siblicide. In contrast, if the youngest nestling was not killed by its older siblings, but later starved to death, the surviving seniors were skeletally smaller and had retarded feather development compared to seniors from other broods. These differences in nestling growth may have longer-term fitness consequences, because kookaburra fledging weight is positively associated with both juvenile survival and successful recruitment into the breeding population. Therefore, although parents of broods without mortality produce the highest number of fledglings and also the highest number of independent juveniles, if parents are unable to raise a full brood, early siblicide may represent the best brood reduction option. Early siblicide is at least associated with high quality young that have enhanced survival and recruitment prospects. In contrast, the poor growth of seniors in broods where the youngest nestling starved suggests that parents overestimated the size of the brood they could provision.
dc.identifier.issn0908-8857
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/1885/73187
dc.publisherMunksgaard International Publishers
dc.sourceJournal of Avian Biology
dc.subjectKeywords: bird; brood size; growth; nestling; siblicide; starvation; Aves; Dacelo; Dacelo gigas; Vertebrata
dc.titleSiblicide, starvation and nestling growth in the laughing kookaburra
dc.typeJournal article
local.bibliographicCitation.lastpage166
local.bibliographicCitation.startpage159
local.contributor.affiliationLegge, Sarah, College of Medicine, Biology and Environment, ANU
local.contributor.authoremailu9411529@anu.edu.au
local.contributor.authoruidLegge, Sarah, u9411529
local.description.notesImported from ARIES
local.description.refereedYes
local.identifier.absfor060201 - Behavioural Ecology
local.identifier.ariespublicationMigratedxPub3592
local.identifier.citationvolume33
local.identifier.doi10.1034/j.1600-048X.2002.330206.x
local.identifier.scopusID2-s2.0-0036274033
local.identifier.uidSubmittedByMigrated
local.type.statusPublished Version

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