Dear MARMAM colleagues,
We are pleased to announce that the following paper is now available online:
Enrico Pirotta, Marc Mangel, Daniel P. Costa, Bruce Mate, Jeremy A. Goldbogen,
Daniel M. Palacios, Luis A. Huckstadt, Elizabeth A. McHuron, Lisa Schwarz and
Leslie New (2018). A dynamic state model of migratory behavior and physiology
to assess the consequences of environmental variation and anthropogenic
disturbance on marine vertebrates. The American Naturalist 191(2).
Abstract:
Integrating behavior and physiology is critical to formulating new hypotheses
on the evolution of animal life-history strategies. Migratory capital breeders
acquire most of the energy they need to sustain migration, gestation and
lactation before parturition. Therefore, when predicting the impact of
environmental variation on such species, a mechanistic understanding of the
physiology of their migratory behavior is required. Using baleen whales as a
model system, we developed a dynamic state variable model that captures the
interplay among behavioral decisions, energy, reproductive needs and the
environment. We applied the framework to blue whales (Balaenoptera musculus) in
the Eastern North Pacific Ocean, and explored the effects of environmental and
anthropogenic perturbations on female reproductive success. We demonstrate the
emergence of migration to track prey resources, enabling us to quantify the
trade-offs among capital breeding, body condition, and metabolic expenses. We
predict that periodic climatic oscillations affect reproductive success less
than unprecedented environmental changes do. The effect of localized, acute
anthropogenic impacts depended on whales’ behavioral response to the
disturbance; chronic, but weaker, disturbances had little effect on
reproductive success. Because we link behavior and vital rates by modeling
individuals’ energetic budgets, we provide a general framework to investigate
the ecology of migration and assess the population consequences of disturbance,
while identifying critical knowledge gaps.
KEY WORDS: bioenergetic modeling; environmental changes; marine mammal;
population consequences of disturbance; Stochastic Dynamic Programming;
uncertainty
A PDF copy of the paper can be downloaded from:
http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/695135
Please do not hesitate to contact me for any question regarding our work.
Best Regards,
Enrico Pirotta
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