Sex, moulting dynamics, and reproductive status in Atlantic Forest tanagers and their collective impact on body condition

ABSTRACT

Body condition in individuals is intricately linked to behaviour, physiology, and immunity. This study investigated how seasonal factors, such as reproduction and moulting, influence the body condition of 21 tanager species in the Atlantic Forest. Utilising publicly available data, I employed phylogenetic generalised linear mixed models to dissect these influences. Notably, females with brood patches exhibited concurrent body and feather moult, suggesting simultaneous energy-costly constraints. Furthermore, females with brood patches displayed higher body condition, indicating proactive preparation or increased resource availability during breeding. Lastly, individuals moulting body feathers exhibited enhanced body condition, suggesting heightened foraging activity. These data suggest complex connections between sex, moulting, and reproductive status in tanagers in the Atlantic Forest.

KEYWORDS:

• Atlantic Forest Biome
• Brazil
• body mass
• tail feathers length
• physiology
• energy trade-off

Acknowledgments

VAP expresses gratitude to the Organismal and Evolutionary Research Programme of the University of Helsinki, as well as the European Union fellowship that provided funding for the Identification of Best Practices for Biodiversity Recovery and Public Health Interventions to Prevent Future Epidemics and Pandemics (BEPREP) project, including support for VAP during the development of this study. I acknowledge the important contributions and thorough reviews provided by the Editor and Reviewers associated with Emu–Austral Ornithology. Their insights and suggestions have significantly enhanced the comprehensiveness of this study.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Data availability statement

The dataset is available in the literature (Rodrigues et al. 2019), while the corresponding R code can be accessed from the GitHub repository at https://github.com/victoraspenha/body-condition-in-tanagers.

Supplementary material

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed at https://doi.org/10.1080/01584197.2024.2328675.