viernes, 17 de febrero de 2017

New Publication on colonization in social species !

Payo-Payo, A., Genovart, M., Sanz-Aguilar, A., Greño, J.L., García-Tarrasón, ., Bertlero A. and Oro, D., Colonisation in social species: the importance of breeding experience for dispersal in overcoming information barriers. Scientific Report. doi:10.1038/srep42866

Abstract: Studying colonisation is crucial to understand metapopulations, evolutionary ecology and species resilience to global change. Unfortunately, few empirical data are available because field monitoring that includes empty patches at large spatiotemporal scales is required.
from wikipedia.com
We examine the colonisation dynamics of a long-lived seabird over 34 years in the western Mediterranean by comparing population and individual data from both source colony and the newly-formed colonies. Since social information is not available, we hypothesize that colonisation should follow particular dispersal dynamics and personal information must be crucial in decision making. We test if adverse breeding conditions trigger colonisation events, if personal information plays a role in colonisation and if colonisers experience greater fitness. Our results show a temporal mismatch between colonisation events and both density-dependence and perturbations at the source colony, probably because colonisers needed a longer prospecting period to compensate for the lack of public information. Colonisers were mostly experienced individuals gaining higher breeding success in the new colony. Our results highlight the demographic value that experienced individuals can have on metapopulation dynamics of social long-lived organisms.

lunes, 13 de febrero de 2017

GEP at the International Day of Women and Girls in Science 2017

Dr. Ana Sanz-Aguilar and Ana Payo-Payo from the GEP have participated a the International Day of Women and Girls in Science 2017 to "achieve full and equal access to and participation in science for women and girls, and further achieve gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls".
From "Ultima Hora"



A nice initiative and a good occasion to explain Science to the new generations. 


Workshop on Capture-Recapture and -Recovery at MUSE ended



The Workshop on Capture-Recapture and -Recovery at MUSE in collaboration with Dr. S. Tenan ended last Friday. It has been a very nice and interesting meeting with data on wolves, migratory birds, wild boards, gulls... surrounded by Trento mountains. Thank you all and thank to Simone for organizing this. The next workshop is scheduled in Mallorca this November.