Tropical birds have a slow pace of life.

ABSTRACT: Tropical birds are relatively long-lived and produce few offspring, which develop slowly and mature relatively late in life, the slow end of the life-history axis, whereas temperate birds lie at the opposite end of this continuum. We tested the hypothesis that tropical birds have evolved a reduced basal metabolic rate (BMR). We measured BMR of 69 species of tropical birds, the largest data set amassed on metabolic rates of tropical birds, and compared these measurements with 59 estimates of BMR for temperate birds. Our analyses included conventional least squares regression, regressions based on phylogenetic independent contrasts, and a comparison of BMR of 13 phylogenetically matched pairs, one species from the tropics and one from northerly temperate areas. Our triptych showed that tropi

SUBMITTER: Wiersma P 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC1890496 | biostudies-literature | 2007 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature