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Shift of Bird Nesting Time in Central Siberia due to Climate Warming: Phenotypic Plasticity or Genetic Shift?

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Abstract

Numerous facts regarding a shift in birds’ breeding time on the background of climate warming have been accumulated over the past decades. Most studies note a correlation between the population laying date and the temperature of a certain period, but the reasons and mechanism of this relationship remain unclear. Individual-based genetic studies, despite their significant success, are too complex and time-consuming, and their resolution is still insufficient to prove directed genetic changes associated with climate warming. We have implemented a population-based approach to the analysis of laying dates in 6054 nests of the most abundant species in a poorly studied natural region for the period from 1974 to 2016. In the search for the maximum climatic dependence, we checked the influence of three weather indicators, different exposure dates, and the response of each fraction of the population that successively enters breeding. We have found that the maximum response is associated with a phenological indicator based on the sum of active temperatures. The greatest influence fell in the 35% quantile of the laying dates in the season, which coincided with the modal day in the population. The difference of the phenological situation from the norm at the beginning of nesting was maintained for the following weeks and thus could serve as a reliable source of information on the timing of prospective food abundance. This must increase the efficiency of selection for an optimal laying date according to the results of reproduction, thereby explaining the mechanism of climate reaction. We decomposed the observed laying dates and the dates of achievement of the necessary phenological conditions into components associated with a long-term trend and annual fluctuations. Comparing these data series, we obtained an independent assessment of the environmental influence on annual deviations and the long-term displacement of breeding dates. The annual deviations of the conditions caused a proportional response: short-distance migrants compensated for the environmental change by about half, long-distance migrants by nearly 1/3, and the eastern migrants compensated less than half as much as the western ones. Under extreme phenological conditions, the response of some species was less than proportional, which indicated the limit of phenotypic plasticity. In years that separated by a long interval but similar in spring phenology, egg laying occurred significantly earlier. Over the entire observation period, the spring phenology shifted by more than 12 days and caused the same shift in the nesting time in short-distance migrants, while long-distance migrants compensated for the shift by less than 2/3. The long-term shift in the laying dates has exceeded their standard deviation in populations by an average of 2.7 times. Thus, the described phenomena go well beyond phenotypic plasticity and suggest that there is a significant genetic shift in laying dates.

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Funding

The study was supported by grant of the Russian Foundation for Basic Research, project no. 18-04-00269a.

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  1. Severtsov Institute of Ecology and Evolution, Russian Academy of Sciences, 119071, Moscow, Russia

    O. V. Bourski

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Correspondence to O. V. Bourski.

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Statement on the welfare of animals. All applicable international, national, and/or institutional guidelines for the care and use of animals were followed.

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Translated by L. Solovyova

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Bourski, O.V. Shift of Bird Nesting Time in Central Siberia due to Climate Warming: Phenotypic Plasticity or Genetic Shift?. Biol Bull Rev 11, 303–316 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1134/S2079086421030026

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1134/S2079086421030026

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