Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: http://hdl.handle.net/1959.14/88580
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- Title
- Egg size predicts motor performance and postnatal weight gain of Australia Brush-turkey (Alectura lathami) hatchlings
- Related
- Canadian journal of zoology, Vol. 82, No. 6 (2004), p.972-979
- DOI
- 10.1139/z04-070
- Publisher
- National Research Council Canada
- Date
- 2004
- FoR/RFCD Code(s)
-
060800 Zoology
- Author/Creator
- Göth, Ann
- Author/Creator
- Evans, Christopher S
- Description
- Birds usually influence offspring survival through the amount of parental care they provide. Megapodes have evolved a different life history. Eggs are incubated by external heat sources, and chicks dig themselves out of their underground nest and live independently of their parents. Egg size is one of the few means by which females can influence chick survival. We found that in the Australian Brush-turkey, Alectura lathami Gray, 1831, eggs and hatchlings varied considerably in size, with a ratio of 1.62 between the largest and the smallest egg. Egg size was positively correlated with hatchling body mass and tarsus length. It also significantly predicted the chicks' motor performance: chicks from larger eggs dug their way out of their underground nest faster and were more active when kept in a resting box and monitored by motion detection software. The main advantage of reaching the surface more quickly is likely that such chicks will have more time to find suitable food, refuge, and a tree for roosting at night while still feeding on their internal yolk reserves. Egg size also interacted significantly with body mass during the first 10 months of life. A size advantage at hatching thus seems to have an immediate effect on motor performance and a longer term effect on the ability to gain mass.
- Description
- 8 page(s)
- Subject Keyword
- 060800 Zoology
- Resource Type
- journal article
- Organisation
- Macquarie University. Dept. of Psychology
- Identifier
- http://hdl.handle.net/1959.14/88580
- Identifier
- ISSN:0008-4301
- Identifier
- mq-rm-2009007151
- Language
- eng
- Reviewed
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