Artwork by Dr. Cara Gallagher Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellowship - Project Number 890284 - awarded under the Horizon 2020 EU funding Host Institution: Centre d’Etudes Biologiques de Chizé (CEBC) Project Abstract Recent technological advances have permitted the collection of novel high-frequency information about animal behaviour, physiology and characteristics of the environment in which animals move. Such technology-driven achievements are exciting, but it is important to analyse these data with a view to their original objectives: understanding individual behaviour, predicting population processes and optimizing species monitoring and conservation programs. Despite a growing number of tracked animals, long term movement dataset are a present-day achievement. As a consequence, while many studies of animal movements are motivated by questions on population dynamics, the explicit connection between the two is rarely attained. Through MUFFIN, I will make use of nearly ten years of high resolution bio-logging datasets collected on three species of top marine predators moving in environments difficult to monitor: Little penguins, Adelie penguins and Southern elephant seals. With these unique data, MUFFIN will answer questions related to effects of changes of availability of marine resources on breeding success, predators foraging behaviour, decision making and habitat use. I will (I) quantify changes in foraging behaviour across spatio-temporal scales, characterise type of foraging patches visited and energy spent. I will (II) model the effect of foraging patches visited, energy spent and environment encountered aiming to understand animal decision making, use of environmental features and changes in space used. I will (III) link foraging behaviours, effort spent and type of patch to breeding success, highlighting fitness consequences of changes of behavioural patterns. In accomplishing MUFFIN's objectives I will open powerful new avenues for the use and analysis of large high resolution movement data. These approaches are key for research seeking to optimise strategies for habitat management and species monitoring. Publications: Comments are closed.
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