Not all spatially structured populations are metapopulations: Re-examining paradigms for a threatened shorebird

For at-risk species, understanding population vital rates is imperative for developing informed conservation strategies and population models. Managers often assume that species that are spatially distributed among patches of suitable habitat meet the criteria of a metapopulation. Metapopulation dynamics are determined not only by within-patch birth and death processes but also by between-patch dispersal movements of individuals that are infrequent but critical to maintaining population viability across space and time. To conserve and manage such species, an understanding of all these vital rates, including connectivity, is required. The degree to which the northern Great Plains piping plover (Charadrius melodus) breeding population functions as a metapopulation depends, in part, on the rate of movement among patchily distributed breeding areas. Here, we examined annual adult survival and breeding dispersal probabilities for 2582 individuals at two spatial scales within the northern Great Plains piping plover breeding population between 2014 and 2019. Inconsistent with a metapopulation structure, annual survival varied minimally among breeding regions but did vary across years. We also found that breeding dispersal probabilities were temporally variable, high, and unbalanced at both spatial scales examined, suggesting high connectivity in contrast to metapopulation dynamics. Further, we detected context-dependent effects of reproductive success on dispersal decisions. Individuals were more likely to disperse from the northern Missouri River to the US Alkali Wetlands following nest failure due to inundation or severe storms (including in the year prior to dispersal), whereas dispersal from the US Alkali Wetlands to the northern Missouri River decreased following successful nest attempts. Individuals also decreased dispersal from the US Alkali Wetlands to the northern Missouri River in response to renesting attempts in both the year of interest and the year prior to dispersal. Our results contradict the paradigm that northern Great Plains piping plovers are structured as a metapopulation and instead suggest a patchily distributed, likely panmictic, population. Our findings have implications for the conservation and management of this listed species and are also a general reminder that in the absence of robust knowledge of movement, spatial variation in birth and death processes across patches should not be conflated with a metapopulation structure.