scholarly journals Ontogenetic shifts from social to experiential learning drive avian migration timing

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Briana Abrahms ◽  
Claire S. Teitelbaum ◽  
Thomas Mueller ◽  
Sarah J. Converse

AbstractMigrating animals may benefit from social or experiential learning, yet whether and how these learning processes interact or change over time to produce observed migration patterns remains unexplored. Using 16 years of satellite-tracking data from 105 reintroduced whooping cranes, we reveal an interplay between social and experiential learning in migration timing. Both processes dramatically improved individuals’ abilities to dynamically adjust their timing to track environmental conditions along the migration path. However, results revealed an ontogenetic shift in the dominant learning process, whereby subadult birds relied on social information, while mature birds primarily relied on experiential information. These results indicate that the adjustment of migration phenology in response to the environment is a learned skill that depends on both social context and individual age. Assessing how animals successfully learn to time migrations as environmental conditions change is critical for understanding intraspecific differences in migration patterns and for anticipating responses to global change.

2020 ◽  
Vol 98 (Supplement_3) ◽  
pp. 54-55
Author(s):  
Leigh Ruckman ◽  
Stacie Gould ◽  
John Patience

Abstract Mycotoxins may not be an issue every year, but the proper environmental conditions can cause a spike in contaminated grains and cause severe economic impact on pork producers. The objective of this study was to determine the effect of naturally occurring infections of deoxynivalenol, zearalenone and fumonisins (DZF) on growth performance and carcass parameters in grow/finish pigs. One hundred pigs (BW 34.0 ± 0.9 kg; L337 × Camborough, PIC, Hendersonville, TN) were randomly assigned to 1 of 2 dietary treatments with 10 split-sex pens/treatment. The control diet (CTL) contained low levels of DZF and the CTL+DFZ diet contained high levels of DZF. Diets were fed in 4 phases over the 126-d experiment period. The CTL diet contained 1.6, 1.6, 1.8 and 1.2 mg deoxynivalenol/kg and CTL+DZF contained 9.2, 6.9, 5.8 and 3.8 mg deoxynivalenol/kg in the 4 diet phases, respectively. The CTL contained 0.30, 0.32, 0.51 and 0.32 mg zearalenone/kg and 0.7, 0.8, 0.8 and 0.9 mg total fumonisins/kg; CTL+DFZ contained 0.59, 0.72, 0.86 and 0.57 mg zearalenone/kg and 1.0, 1.1, 1.2 and 0.9 mg total fumonisins/kg for phases one through four, respectively. Data were analyzed using PROC MIXED of SAS (9.4) with treatment, sex, and their interaction as fixed effects. Compared to CTL, feeding CTL+DFZ decreased final BW (130.3 vs 120.5 kg; P< 0.001), ADG (0.95 vs 0.79 kg/d; P< 0.001), ADFI (2.73 vs 2.49 kg/d; P=0.016), and G:F (0.35 vs 0.32; P=0.043). Feeding CTL+DFZ decreased HCW (92.3 vs 89.4 kg; P=0.024) and increased dressing percentage (70.9 vs 74.3%; P=0.009) and tended to reduce loin depth (7.0 vs 6.8 cm; P=0.057) compared to CTL. Diet did not affect backfat depth or lean percentage (P >0.10). In conclusion, diets naturally contaminated with multiple mycotoxins reduced growth performance and adversely affected carcass parameters; pigs did not adapt over time to the mycotoxins.


2016 ◽  
Vol 52 (7) ◽  
pp. 965-981 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carmi Schooler ◽  
Leslie J Caplan ◽  
Pakuy Pierre Mounkoro ◽  
Chiaka Diakité

We examine the effects of socio-environmental change on personality in Mali in three ways, using data from a longitudinal two-wave (1994, 2004) survey conducted in rural Mali. Firstly, we compare the between-wave personality stability of Anxiety, Self-confidence, Mastery/Fatalism, and Authoritarianism with that in USA, Japan, Poland, and Ukraine. Secondly, we examine socio-economic hardship and political instability in pre-industrial Mali. Thirdly, we examine patterns of psychological reaction to political and social change during the study period. Our findings have implications for comparisons and generalizations across times and cultures about the contribution of socio-environmental conditions to over-time change in personality.


BMC Genomics ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Melanie Lindner ◽  
Irene Verhagen ◽  
Heidi M. Viitaniemi ◽  
Veronika N. Laine ◽  
Marcel E. Visser ◽  
...  

Abstract Background DNA methylation is likely a key mechanism regulating changes in gene transcription in traits that show temporal fluctuations in response to environmental conditions. To understand the transcriptional role of DNA methylation we need simultaneous within-individual assessment of methylation changes and gene expression changes over time. Within-individual repeated sampling of tissues, which are essential for trait expression is, however, unfeasible (e.g. specific brain regions, liver and ovary for reproductive timing). Here, we explore to what extend between-individual changes in DNA methylation in a tissue accessible for repeated sampling (red blood cells (RBCs)) reflect such patterns in a tissue unavailable for repeated sampling (liver) and how these DNA methylation patterns are associated with gene expression in such inaccessible tissues (hypothalamus, ovary and liver). For this, 18 great tit (Parus major) females were sacrificed at three time points (n = 6 per time point) throughout the pre-laying and egg-laying period and their blood, hypothalamus, ovary and liver were sampled. Results We simultaneously assessed DNA methylation changes (via reduced representation bisulfite sequencing) and changes in gene expression (via RNA-seq and qPCR) over time. In general, we found a positive correlation between changes in CpG site methylation in RBCs and liver across timepoints. For CpG sites in close proximity to the transcription start site, an increase in RBC methylation over time was associated with a decrease in the expression of the associated gene in the ovary. In contrast, no such association with gene expression was found for CpG site methylation within the gene body or the 10 kb up- and downstream regions adjacent to the gene body. Conclusion Temporal changes in DNA methylation are largely tissue-general, indicating that changes in RBC methylation can reflect changes in DNA methylation in other, often less accessible, tissues such as the liver in our case. However, associations between temporal changes in DNA methylation with changes in gene expression are mostly tissue- and genomic location-dependent. The observation that temporal changes in DNA methylation within RBCs can relate to changes in gene expression in less accessible tissues is important for a better understanding of how environmental conditions shape traits that temporally change in expression in wild populations.


2016 ◽  
Vol 43 (2) ◽  
pp. 172-180 ◽  
Author(s):  
ALICE B. KELLY ◽  
A. CLARE GUPTA

SUMMARYThis study considers the issue of security in the context of protected areas in Cameroon and Botswana. Though the literature on issues of security and well-being in relation to protected areas is extensive, there has been less discussion of how and in what ways these impacts and relationships can change over time, vary with space and differ across spatial scales. Looking at two very different historical trajectories, this study considers the heterogeneity of the security landscapes created by Waza and Chobe protected areas over time and space. This study finds that conservation measures that various subsets of the local population once considered to be ‘bad’ (e.g. violent, exclusionary protected area creation) may be construed as ‘good’ at different historical moments and geographical areas. Similarly, complacency or resignation to the presence of a park can be reversed by changing environmental conditions. Changes in the ways security (material and otherwise) has fluctuated within these two protected areas has implications for the long-term management and funding strategies of newly created and already existing protected areas today. This study suggests that parks must be adaptively managed not only for changing ecological conditions, but also for shifts in a protected area's social, political and economic context.


2005 ◽  
Vol 53 (13) ◽  
pp. 1331-1340 ◽  
Author(s):  
S. Goossens ◽  
P.N.A.M. Visser ◽  
B.A.C. Ambrosius

Author(s):  
Kristin Holte HAUG

Abstract: This article presents Norwegian Kindergarten Teacher students’ and Kindergarten staff’s use of Digital Storytelling (DS), a tool for reflection and learning in higher education. The field of DS’ research focus on the use of personal narratives in the learning process, multimedia, and the creative process in developing identity and voice in a social context: the Story Circle. The frame is Workplace-based Kindergarten Teacher Education. The article is based on a case: student Yvonne’s work with DS in her kindergarten. Data is collected through observation and analyzed in light of theories on learning in practice, concretized to Kolb's experiential learning cycle. Results indicate that DS is a beneficial approach for facilitating both individual and collective reflection. A significant condition is that kindergarten staff participates in students' learning processes. Sammendrag: Artikkelen tar for seg barnehagelærerstudenters og barnehageansattes bruk av digital historiefortelling (DH), som er en arbeidsmåte for refleksjon og læring i høyere utdanning. DH kjennetegnes ved: fortellingens betydningen for læring i forhold til tradisjonell sakprosa, den multimodale dimensjonen og den kreative prosessen hvor fortellingen blir til i en sosial kontekst: fortellersirkelen. Rammen er Arbeidsplassbasert barnehagelærerutdanning. Artikkelen baseres på et case: studenten Yvonnes arbeid med DH i egen barnehage. Data er innhentet gjennom observasjon og fortolkes i lys av teorier om læring i praksis, konkretisert til Kolbs erfaringslæringsmodell. Jeg viser at DH tilrettelegger for individuell og kollektiv refleksjon for både studenter og barnehageansatte. Forutsetningen er at ansatte gis muligheter til å delta i studentenes læringsprosesser.


2002 ◽  
Vol 59 (12) ◽  
pp. 1845-1850 ◽  
Author(s):  
Luc A Comeau ◽  
Steven E Campana ◽  
Martin Castonguay

The migration patterns of marine fishes are poorly known, in part owing to the technical limitations associated with tracking the movements of animals in deep water. Here we document a large-scale, directed, migration of Atlantic cod (Gadus morhua) off eastern Canada. Our approach was based on the acoustic tagging of 126 fish and the deployment of 69 subsurface receivers, stretching over a 160-km distance along the edge of the Laurentian Channel. After 1 year of automated recording, we found that 65% of the fish migrated out of coastal waters in two distinct runs during the summer–autumn period. The offshore-migrating fish overwintered in deep Laurentian Channel waters, returning inshore in April. Individual migration routes and migration timing were variable, indicating that the cod did not aggregate in large schools during the seasonal migration events.


2018 ◽  
Vol 56 (3) ◽  
pp. 562-572 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fabrizio Sergio ◽  
Alessandro Tanferna ◽  
Julio Blas ◽  
Guillermo Blanco ◽  
Fernando Hiraldo

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