Abstract
AbstractStudies of the effects of transmitters on wildlife often focus on survival. However, sublethal behavioral changes resulting from radio-marking have the potential to affect inferences from telemetry data and may vary based on individual and environmental characteristics. We used a long-term, multi-species tracking study of sea ducks to assess behavioral patterns at multiple temporal scales following implantation of intracoelomic satellite transmitters. We applied state-space models to assess short-term behavioral patterns in 476 individuals with implanted satellite transmitters, as well as comparing breeding site attendance and migratory phenology across multiple years after capture. In the short term, our results suggest an increase in dispersive behavior immediately following capture and transmitter implantation; however, behavior returned to seasonally average patterns within ~5 days after release. Over multiple years, we found that breeding site attendance by both males and females was depressed during the first breeding season after radio-marking relative to subsequent years, with larger relative decreases in breeding site attendance among males than females. We also found that spring and breeding migrations occurred later in the first year after radio-marking than in subsequent years. Across all behavioral effects, the severity of behavioral change often varied by species, sex, age, and capture season. We conclude that, although individuals appear to adjust relatively quickly (i.e. within 1 week) to implanted satellite transmitters, changes in breeding phenology may occur over the longer term and should be considered when analyzing and reporting telemetry data.
Highlights
Many conservation decisions and predictive models require a detailed understanding of habitat associations at individual and population scales
If the sublethal effects of radio-marking on individual behavior or fitness are not incorporated into data analysis, they may subsequently bias population-level inferences on habitat use and distribution derived from tracking data (Igual et al 2005, Hebblewhite and Haydon 2010)
In keeping with standard practices for screening sea duck telemetry data, we considered that a bird was exhibiting “normal” seasonal behavior from 14 days after transmitter attachment (Esler 2000) until the first sustained dispersive movement (i.e. b ≤ 1.5 for ≤3 consecutive locations) following transmitter implantation
Summary
Many conservation decisions and predictive models require a detailed understanding of habitat associations at individual and population scales. Studies of sublethal transmitter effects have found that energetic consequences of transmitters may include alterations in day-to-day movements and activity budgets (e.g., individual behavior: Hamel et al 2004, Latty et al 2010, Enstipp et al 2015, Kenow et al 2018) or fitness (e.g., survival and reproduction: Fast et al 2011, Schacter and Jones 2017, Lameris et al 2018) and may vary across short- and long-term timescales and among species, individuals, transmitter types, and attachment techniques (Barron et al 2010, Fast et al 2011, Vandenabeele et al 2012, Lameris and Kleyheeg 2017) Factors such as handling time, sex, breeding location, and timing of capture have previously been linked to variation in negative effects of capture and tagging among groups of individuals (Lamb et al 2016, Snijders et al 2017). To ensure that data obtained from tracked individuals accurately represent the general population, it is important to consider sublethal impacts of capture and tagging, and their variation among individuals, in analyses and interpretation of telemetry data
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