Data from: Environmental drivers of variability in the movement ecology of turkey vultures (Cathartes aura) in North and South America
Data from: Environmental drivers of variability in the movement ecology of turkey vultures (Cathartes aura) in North and South America
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Date
2014-04-14
Citation
Bildstein KL, Barber D, Bechard MJ. 2014. Data from: Environmental drivers of variability in the movement ecology of turkey vultures (Cathartes aura) in North and South America. Movebank Data Repository. https://doi.org/10.5441/001/1.46ft1k05Abstract
NOTE: An updated and larger version of this dataset is available. See https://doi.org/10.5441/001/1.f3qt46r2. ABSTRACT: Variation is key to the adaptability of species and their ability to survive changes to the Earth’s climate and habitats. Plasticity in movement strategies allows a species to better track spatial dynamics of habitat quality. We describe the mechanisms that shape the movement of a long-distance migrant bird (turkey vulture, Cathartes aura) across two continents using satellite tracking coupled with remote-sensing science. Using nearly 10 years of data from 24 satellite-tracked vultures in four distinct populations, we describe an enormous amount of variation in their movement patterns. We related vulture movement to environmental conditions and found important correlations explaining how far they need to move to find food (indexed by the normalized difference vegetation index) and how fast they can move based on the prevalence of thermals and temperature. We conclude that the extensive variability in the movement ecology of turkey vultures, facilitated by their energetically efficient thermal soaring, suggests that this species is likely to do well across periods of modest climate change. The large scale and sample sizes needed for such analysis in a widespread migrant emphasizes the need for integrated and collaborative efforts to obtain tracking data and for policies, tools and open datasets to encourage such collaborations and data sharing.
Keywords
Cathartes aura,avian scavengers,Cathartes aura,movement ecology,satellite telemetry,turkey vultures
DOIs of related Publications
BibTex
@misc{001/1_46ft1k05,
title = {Data from: Environmental drivers of variability in the movement ecology of turkey vultures (Cathartes aura) in North and South America},
author = {Bildstein, KL and Barber, D and Bechard, MJ},
year = {2014},
URL = {http://dx.doi.org/10.5441/001/1.46ft1k05},
doi = {doi:10.5441/001/1.46ft1k05},
publisher = {Movebank data repository}
}RIS
TY - DATA ID - doi:10.5441/001/1.46ft1k05 T1 - Data from: Environmental drivers of variability in the movement ecology of turkey vultures (Cathartes aura) in North and South America AU - Bildstein, Keith L. AU - Barber, David AU - Bechard, Marc J. Y1 - 2014/04/14 KW - Cathartes aura KW - animal migration KW - avian scavengers KW - Cathartes aura KW - movement ecology KW - satellite telemetry KW - turkey vultures KW - Cathartes aura PB - Movebank data repository UR - http://dx.doi.org/10.5441/001/1.46ft1k05 DO - doi:10.5441/001/1.46ft1k05 ER -