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Hatching Asynchrony and Spring Climatic Conditions in the European Roller

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Abstract

Hatching asynchrony (HA hereafter) leads to patent age and size hierarchies within broods of altricial birds, disadvantaging runts through a reduced condition/survival. The function of HA is controversial, although a general hypothesis states that HA would be an adaptive maternal mechanism for maximizing reproductive output under particular ecological conditions. Accordingly, when ecological conditions are not favourable, asynchronous broods would outperform synchronous broods because the formers would allow for an adaptive adjustment of brood size. A poorly untested prediction emerging from this hypothesis is that the adaptive value of HA should change with environmental conditions in relatively long time windows within a population. Using data from 8 years of a population of the asynchronous European roller Coracias garrulus, we studied variation in HA and fecundity selection on HA. Hatching span (ranging from 1 to 8 days) was longer in larger broods and later in the breeding season. Interestingly, we found that asynchronous broods were more fecund than synchronous ones in colder and drier years in April, which is the previous month to reproduction, and the opposite was true in years with warmer but rainier Aprils. Given that warmer and rainier Aprils relate to advanced and increased arthropod availability in the Mediterranean region, these results would suggest that HA in rollers might function as an adaptive trait that provides parents of asynchronous broods with some benefits in years with low productivity, in agreement with the Lack’s brood reduction hypothesis, and illustrate the relevance of studying the adaptive value of HA over gradients of environmental conditions.

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Acknowledgments

We thank J. Rodríguez-Ruiz and F. Goytre who helped us with data collection. This study was funded by the Spanish Ministry of Education and Science/FEDER through the Projects CGL2005-04654/BOS, CGL2008-00718/BOS and CGL2011-27561/BOS to DP and JMA, PIE 200930I029 to JMA and by the Government of Extremadura through the contract TA13002 to DP.

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  1. Área de Zoología, Departamento de Anatomía, Biología Celular y Zoología, Facultad de Ciencias, Universidad de Extremadura, Avenida de Elvas s/n, 06006, Badajoz, Spain

    Deseada Parejo

  2. Estación Experimental de Zonas Áridas, CSIC, Ctra. de Sacramento s/n, La Cañada de San Urbano, 04120, Almería, Spain

    Deseada Parejo, Jesús M. Avilés & Mónica Expósito

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  1. Deseada Parejo
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  2. Jesús M. Avilés
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  3. Mónica Expósito
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Correspondence to Deseada Parejo.

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Ethical Statement

Data was collected under license of the Junta de Andalucía, Spanish region in which the study was done. Therefore, data collection complies with the current laws of Spain, where the study was performed.

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Parejo, D., Avilés, J.M. & Expósito, M. Hatching Asynchrony and Spring Climatic Conditions in the European Roller. Evol Biol 42, 443–451 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11692-015-9337-4

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