Flight activity and effort of breeding pied flycatchers in the wild, revealed with accelerometers and machine learning.

ABSTRACT: Flight behaviours of birds have been extensively studied from different angles such as their kinematics, aerodynamics and, more generally, their migration patterns. Nevertheless, much is still unknown about the daily foraging flight activity and behaviour of breeding birds, and potential differences among males and females. The recent development of miniaturized accelerometers allows us a glimpse into the daily life of a songbird. Here, we tagged 13 male and 13 female pied flycatchers (Ficedula hypoleuca) with accelerometers and used machine learning approaches to analyse their flight activity and effort during the chick rearing period. We found that during 2 h of foraging, chick-rearing pied flycatchers were flying on average 13.7% of the time. Almost all flights (>99%) were short flights

SUBMITTER: Yu H 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11491815 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature