Conditions during adulthood affect cohort-specific reproductive success in an Arctic-nesting goose population.

ABSTRACT: Variation in fitness between individuals in populations may be attributed to differing environmental conditions experienced among birth (or hatch) years (i.e., between cohorts). In this study, we tested whether cohort fitness could also be explained by environmental conditions experienced in years post-hatch, using 736 lifelong resighting histories of Greenland white-fronted geese (Anser albifrons flavirostris) marked in their first winter. Specifically, we tested whether variation in age at first successful reproduction, the size of the first successful brood and the proportion of successful breeders by cohort was explained by environmental conditions experienced on breeding areas in west Greenland during hatch year, those in adulthood prior to successful reproduction and those in the yea

SUBMITTER: Weegman MD 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4888290 | biostudies-literature | 2016

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature