Age and reproduction in birds — hypotheses and tests

It is well known that reproductive performance improves with age in birds. Many hypotheses, involving factors such as differential survival, delayed breeding, breeding experience, foraging ability and reproductive effort, have been proposed to explain this pattern. Although these hypotheses are not...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Trends in ecology & evolution (Amsterdam) 1995-09, Vol.10 (9), p.374-378
Main Authors: Forslund, Pär, Pärt, Tomas
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Animal and plant ecology
Animal, plant and microbial ecology
Animals
Autoecology
Aves
Biological and medical sciences
Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology
Vertebrata
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Summary:It is well known that reproductive performance improves with age in birds. Many hypotheses, involving factors such as differential survival, delayed breeding, breeding experience, foraging ability and reproductive effort, have been proposed to explain this pattern. Although these hypotheses are not mutually exclusive, they can be classified in three major groups relating to progressive appearance or disappearance of phenotypes, age-related improvements of competence, and optimization of reproductive effort. However, a closer examination of the literature reveals that only few studies have rigorously tested the hypotheses. Future work should focus on carefully designed tests that critically investigate the hypotheses.
ISSN:0169-5347
1872-8383
DOI:10.1016/S0169-5347(00)89141-7