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Within-season dispersal does not protect re-nesting great reed warblers (Acrocephalus arundinaceus) from repeated common cuckoo (Cuculus canorus) parasitism

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Abstract

The co-evolutionary arms race between brood parasites and their hosts involves stepwise adaptive changes on the side of the parasites as well as hosts. In response to avian brood parasitism, host females may eject a parasitic egg, bury the parasitized clutch or desert it. After nest desertion, females commonly re-nest and may move further to avoid being parasitized again. Here we tested whether and under which conditions the within-season re-nesting prevents brood parasitism in the great reed warbler (Acrocephalus arundinaceus). We analysed 78 re-nesting events of 58 naturally parasitized host females that deserted their nests in response to the common cuckoo (Cuculus canorus) parasitism. The parasitism rate in the replacement nests of these females was 60%. Most of these females built their replacement nests less than 143 m from the previous nests. The probability for replacement nests to be parasitized increased with increasing instantaneous parasitism rate but not with the re-nesting distance or timing of the replacement clutch. We explain this by the high level of cuckoo parasitism across the whole study site during the major part of the breeding season. To better understand the patterns and consequences of host re-nesting behaviour, further studies in other host populations with different levels of cuckoo parasitism would be desirable.

Significance statement

Although various factors affecting avian breeding dispersal have been studied, little is known about the relationship between the within-season re-nesting distances and fate of replacement nests. Moreover, there is a lack of studies focusing on the consequences of re-nesting dispersal in response to brood parasitism and, to our best knowledge, this is the first study investigating this topic in a host of an evictor parasite.

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Data availability

The datasets generated and/or analysed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request. The custom R code generated during the current study is available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

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Acknowledgements

We would like to thank Miroslav Čapek, Lucie Halová, Václav Jelínek, Tereza Karasová, Klára Morongová, Radka Piálková, Zuzana Šebelíková, Petra Steidlová, Michal Šulc and Klára Žabková for their help in the field. We are grateful to the managers of the Hodonín Fish Farm for the permission to conduct the fieldwork on their grounds and to two anonymous reviewers for their constructive comments.

Funding

The study was supported by the Czech Science Foundation (grant numbers 17-12262S and 20-00648S) and by the Institutional Research Plan (RVO: 68081766). JK was supported by the Charles University UNCE program (UNCE/SCI/005).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Ecology, Faculty of Science, Charles University, Viničná 7, 12844, Prague 2, Czech Republic

    Kateřina Sosnovcová

  2. Institute of Vertebrate Biology, The Czech Academy of Sciences, Květná 8, 60365, Brno, Czech Republic

    Kateřina Sosnovcová, Milica Požgayová, Petr Procházka, Marcel Honza & Jaroslav Koleček

  3. Institute for Environmental Studies, Faculty of Science, Charles University, Benátská 2, 12801, Prague 2, Czech Republic

    Jaroslav Koleček

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  1. Kateřina Sosnovcová
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  2. Milica Požgayová
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  3. Petr Procházka
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  4. Marcel Honza
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  5. Jaroslav Koleček
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Correspondence to Kateřina Sosnovcová.

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The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Ethical approval

The research was conducted in compliance with ethical guidelines. This study was carried out with the permission of the regional nature conservation authorities that allowed us to work on wild protected animals (Czech permit numbers 00312/PA/2008/AOPK, JMK20189/2010, JMK 115874/2013). Bird catching and ringing was conducted under licence (numbers 906, 1023, 1050, 1058) and followed the rules issued by the Czech Bird Ringing Centre. The fieldwork adhered to the Animal Care Protocol of the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic (numbers 173/2008, 128/2010, 039/2011) and was in compliance with the current Czech Law on the Protection of Animals against Mistreatment (licence numbers CZ 01284, CZ 01272).

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Communicated by M. Soler

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Sosnovcová, K., Požgayová, M., Procházka, P. et al. Within-season dispersal does not protect re-nesting great reed warblers (Acrocephalus arundinaceus) from repeated common cuckoo (Cuculus canorus) parasitism. Behav Ecol Sociobiol 74, 69 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00265-020-02846-9

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