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Hunting behaviour and breeding performance of northern goshawks Accipiter gentilis, in relation to resource availability, sex, age and morphology

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Abstract

Animal territories that differ in the availability of food resources will require (all other things being equal) different levels of effort for successful reproduction. As a consequence, breeding performance may become most strongly dependent on factors that affect individual foraging where resources are poor. We investigated potential links between foraging behaviour, reproductive performance and morphology in a goshawk Accipiter gentilis population, which experienced markedly different resource levels in two different parts of the study area (rabbit-rich vs. rabbit-poor areas). Our analyses revealed (1) that rabbit abundance positively affected male reproductive output; (2) that age, size and rabbit abundance (during winter) positively affected different components of female reproductive output; (3) that foraging movements were inversely affected by rabbit abundance for both sexes (for females, this may mainly have reflected poor provisioning by males in the rabbit-poor area); (4) that younger breeders (both in males and females) tended to move over larger distances than older individuals (which may have reflected both a lack of hunting experience and mate searching); and (5) that male body size (wing length) showed some covariation with resource conditions (suggesting possible adaptations to hunting agile avian prey in the rabbit-poor area). Although we are unable to establish firm causal relationships with our observational data set, our results provide an example of how territory quality (here, food abundance) and individual features (here, age and morphology) may combine to shape a predator's foraging behaviour and, ultimately, its breeding performance.

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Acknowledgments

The studies for this paper depended very substantially on the efforts of V. Marcström and M. Karlbom, with help from many field assistants, and financial support from the Swedish Sportsmen's Association and NERC (UK). We thank M.M. Delgado, O. Krüger, M. Melletti, R. Tornberg and an anonymous referee for their constructive comments on the manuscript. The study complied with the current laws of Sweden. V.P. was funded by the Spanish Secretaría General de Universidades, Ministry of Education (Salvador de Madariaga Program), and C.R. held a UK BBSRC David Phillips Fellowship during the preparation of this manuscript (BB/G023913/1 and BB/G023913/2).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Conservation Biology, Estación Biológica de Doñana, C.S.I.C., c/Americo Vespucio s/n, 41092, Seville, Spain

    Vincenzo Penteriani

  2. Finnish Museum of Natural History, Zoological Museum, University of Helsinki, FI-00014, Helsinki, Finland

    Vincenzo Penteriani

  3. Department of Zoology, University of Oxford, South Parks Road, Oxford, OX1 3PS, UK

    Christian Rutz

  4. School of Biology, University of St Andrews, Sir Harold Mitchell Building, St Andrews, KY16 9TH, UK

    Christian Rutz

  5. Natural Environment Research Council Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, Winfrith Technology Centre, Dorchester, DT2 8ZD, UK

    Robert Kenward

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  1. Vincenzo Penteriani
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  2. Christian Rutz
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  3. Robert Kenward
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Correspondence to Vincenzo Penteriani.

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Communicated by: Alexandre Roulin

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Penteriani, V., Rutz, C. & Kenward, R. Hunting behaviour and breeding performance of northern goshawks Accipiter gentilis, in relation to resource availability, sex, age and morphology. Naturwissenschaften 100, 935–942 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00114-013-1093-7

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