Abstract
Arctic birds migrating southwards face a multitude of challenges such as habitat loss, pollution, overexploitation of food resources and climate change impacts. Long-tailed Duck winter populations in the Baltic Sea have declined in recent decades. However, precise spatial data are lacking, especially from males. Thus, we aimed to identify the wintering grounds, timing of migration and stopover sites of males and females. We studied spatiotemporal distribution patterns of eight male and five female Long-tailed Ducks using implanted ARGOS satellite transmitters. Birds were tagged in the breeding season on Kolguev Island, Russia. After the breeding period, Long-tailed Ducks from Kolguev used three main post-breeding areas: most males undertook long distance eastward post-breeding migration to areas around the Yamal and Gydan peninsulas, while one male and four females moved short to the southeast coast of Kolguev, and one female moved to Mezhdusharsky Island in the Novaya Zemlya Archipelago. Autumn migration included stopover sites in the White Sea, Lake Ladoga, the Gulf of Finland and the Gulf of Riga, and all birds except one spent the winter in the southern part of the Baltic Sea, from the Pomeranian coast and Hoburgs bank to the Gulf of Finland. Only one female stayed in the White Sea for the winter. All but one bird used the White Sea as a stopover site in May, suggesting that this area is of special importance.
Highlights
Animals carry out regular annual migration movements in response to temporal fluctuations in resource availability during the annual cycle (Alerstam et al 2003; Dingle and Drake 2007)
Migration multiplies the threats that animals face as they rely on different sites across the annual cycle (Wilcove and Wikelski 2008; Vickery et al 2014)
The birds were captured in the interior of Kolguev Island in June 2019 (Online Resource 1: Table S1) with mist nets erected between small lakes and gillnets located in the tundra lakes with constant monitoring
Summary
Animals carry out regular annual migration movements in response to temporal fluctuations in resource availability during the annual cycle (Alerstam et al 2003; Dingle and Drake 2007). Seasonal environments often provide rich foraging grounds for parts of the year but may become inhospitable at other times. The high Arctic tundra is such a habitat, where the ice-free season is short, and meltwater feeds numerous freshwater lakes (e.g. Smith et al 2007), in which an intense growth and reproduction of invertebrates takes place. The Arctic provides a short but very rich food peak to birds that exploit these habitats. During most of the year, the lakes are frozen and the food is not accessible, forcing animals to migrate to wintering sites at lower latitudes. Migration multiplies the threats that animals face as they rely on different sites across the annual cycle (Wilcove and Wikelski 2008; Vickery et al 2014)
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