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News Release
Divorce in birds: She’s movin’ up, while he’s movin’ out!
11 April 2012
Brill
Divorce and breeding dispersal in the dunlin Calidris alpina: support for the better option hypothesis?
Dunlins are long-lived shorebirds that often mate with the same partner over several seasons. In 126 recorded breeding attempts by dunlins, biologists Lars-Åke Flodin and Donald Blomqvist found that 23% of the pairs divorced.
They compared the breeding success of males and females before and after divorce to explore some causes and consequences of divorce.
Divorcing couples did not differ from non-divorcing couples in nest success in the season preceding divorce, both in terms of total nest failure or the number of eggs in the nest.
Non-divorcing pairs and male divorcees that paired with new partners had similar nest success in consecutive years.
However, female divorcees that found new partners doubled their nest success.
The authors concluded that female dunlins divorce to upgrade to a better mate or territory.
http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/brill/beh/2012/00000149/00000001/art00005
Attached files
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behaviour 149-1-66
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Dunlin (Calidris alpina) scratching itself. Photographed in Shellness, Isle of Sheppey, Kent, UK, in November.Credit: JOHN DEVRIES/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY - © This image is for illustration only and subject to copyright and may not be used or copied in any way without prior permission from Science Photo Library http://www.sciencephoto.com