Meeting Abstract

26.5  Friday, Jan. 4  Multi-year tracking of White storks (Ciconia ciconia): how the environment shapes the movement and behavior of a soaring-gliding inter-continental migrant SAPIR, N*; ROTICS, S.; KAATZ, M.; DAVIDSON, S.; ZURELL, D.; EGGERS, U.; JELTSCH, F.; NATHAN, R.; WIKELSKI, M.; Max Planck Institute for Ornithology, Germany; The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel; Max Planck Institute for Ornithology, Germany; Max Planck Institute for Ornithology, Germany; University of Potsdam, Germany; University of Potsdam, Germany; University of Potsdam, Germany; The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel; Max Planck Institute for Ornithology, Germany nir.sapir@mail.huji.ac.il

Understanding the ways in which environmental factors influence evolutionary fitness is of foremost importance for addressing both basic and applied issues, especially under current and expected scenarios of global change. We used satellite-tracking data to study bird response to stochastic environmental events and to test if these incidents carry over to following seasons throughout the birds’ annual routine. Twenty six birds were followed continuously for 1.5 – 8 years after being equipped with satellite transmitters. Tracking data were processed using MoveBank (www.movebank.org). We examine (1) whether departure for migration and en route staging depends on wind support and hindrance, respectively; (2) if bird cross-country flight speed is affected by wind support and soaring conditions; (3) whether droughts modulate over-winter habitat selection and, migration timing, staging and arrival time to breeding grounds; Environmental data to test these questions include remotely sensed tropical rain and vegetation productivity data, as well as observation-based atmospheric model products. Combining annotated and highly detailed environmental data with bird movement, behavior and breeding information enables better understanding of the causes, mechanisms, and consequences of white stork migration.