Effects of breeding success, mate fidelity and senescence on breeding dispersal of male and female blue‐footed boobies

Abstract

1. Understanding the effects of individual and population factors on variation in breeding dispersal (the movement of individuals between successive breeding sites) is key to identifying the strategies behind breeders' movements. Dispersal is often influenced by multiple factors and these can be confounded with each other. We used 13 years of data on the locations, mates, breeding success and ages of individuals to tease apart the factors influencing breeding dispersal in a colonially breeding long-lived seabird, the blue-footed booby Sula nebouxii. 2. Breeding dispersal varied among and within years. Males dispersed further in years of higher population density, and late breeding males and females dispersed further than early breeders. This temporal variation related to changes in competition for territory was taken into account in all tests of individual factors influencing breeding dispersal. 3. Individuals that retained their mates from the previous year dispersed shorter distances than those that changed their mates. 4. The effect of previous breeding success depended on mate fidelity. Unsuccessful breeding induced greater dispersal in birds that changed their mates but not in birds that retained their mates, indicating that breeders who change mates may take their own previous breeding experience into account during habitat selection. Faithful individuals may have to stay close to their previous sites to encounter their mates. 5. Male divorcees dispersed over shorter distances than their former mates, possibly because males contribute more than females to establishing territories. 6. Dispersal of males and females declined with increasing age over the first 10-11 years of life, then increased in old age, possibly due to senescent decay in the ability to compete for mates and territories.