Related Experiment Video
Updated: Sep 13, 2025
04:55
Using a Thermal Camera to Measure Heat Loss Through Bird Feather Coats
Published on: June 17, 2020
3.6K
Annual Temperature Variation, Not Number of Predators, Predicts Variation in Foraging Group Size Among Pigeons
1Independent Researcher, Montreal, QC, Canada.
Biology
|July 29, 2025
Summary
Pigeon foraging group size increases with latitude and elevation, especially in areas with greater annual temperature variation. Island species show different patterns, suggesting climate variability drives group size, not predator numbers.
Area of Science:
- Ornithology
- Behavioral Ecology
- Biogeography
Background:
- Life history traits exhibit predictable biogeographical patterns.
- Behavioral trait variation across biogeographical gradients is less understood.
Purpose of the Study:
- Investigate global variation in pigeon foraging group size.
- Assess the roles of climate and predation in shaping these patterns.
Main Methods:
- Compiled literature data for pigeon species across diverse latitudes, altitudes, and habitats.
- Analyzed data using a phylogenetic framework accounting for biogeographical and ecological drivers.
Main Results:
- Foraging group size increased with latitude in continental species, but not island species.
- Group size increased at higher elevations.
- Annual temperature variation was the strongest latitudinal predictor, correlating with larger group sizes in continental species.
Conclusions:
- Climatic variability, particularly annual temperature variation, is a key driver of pigeon foraging group size at a biogeographical scale.
- Predation pressure did not show a significant relationship with foraging group size.
Related Concept Videos
00:48Optimal Foraging
12.5K
How animals obtain and eat their food is called foraging behavior. Foraging can include searching for plants and hunting for prey and depends on the species and environment.
12.5K
00:53Migration
8.1K
Migration is long-range, seasonal movement from one region or habitat to another. This common strategy, carried out by many different organisms around the world, is an adaptive response that typically corresponds to changes in an organism’s environment, like resource availability or climate. Migrations can involve huge groups of thousands of animals as well as single individuals traveling alone and can range from thousands of kilometers to just a few hundred meters.
8.1K
02:39Predator-Prey Interactions
19.1K
Predators consume prey for energy. Predators that acquire prey and prey that avoid predation both increase their chances of survival and reproduction (i.e., fitness). Routine predator-prey interactions elicit mutual adaptations that improve predator offenses, such as claws, teeth, and speed, as well as prey defenses, including crypsis, aposematism, and mimicry. Thus, predator-prey interactions resemble an evolutionary arms race.
19.1K
01:21Testing a Claim about Mean: Unknown Population SD
3.6K
A complete procedure of testing a hypothesis about a population mean when the population standard deviation is unknown is explained here.
Estimating a population mean requires the samples to be approximately normally distributed. The data should be collected from the randomly selected samples having no sampling bias. There is no specific requirement for sample size. But if the sample size is less than 30, and we don't know the population standard deviation, a different approach is used;...
Estimating a population mean requires the samples to be approximately normally distributed. The data should be collected from the randomly selected samples having no sampling bias. There is no specific requirement for sample size. But if the sample size is less than 30, and we don't know the population standard deviation, a different approach is used;...
3.6K
01:46Types of Selection
41.5K
Natural selection influences the frequencies of particular alleles and phenotypes within populations in several different ways. Primarily, natural selection can be directional, stabilizing, or disruptive. Directional selection favors one extreme trait and shifts the population towards that phenotype while selecting against individuals displaying alternate traits. Stabilizing selection favors an intermediate trait with a narrow range of variation. Deviation from the optimal phenotype towards an...
41.5K
01:21Frequency-dependent Selection
22.2K
When the fitness of a trait is influenced by how common it is (i.e., its frequency) relative to different traits within a population, this is referred to as frequency-dependent selection. Frequency-dependent selection may occur between species or within a single species. This type of selection can either be positive—with more common phenotypes having higher fitness—or negative, with rarer phenotypes conferring increased fitness.
22.2K