Unravelling the third dimension of bird migration

With the project I aim to reveal how migratory birds use adaptive behaviours to counter physiological and environmental limitations to facilitate long-distance flights, and the costs, consequences and ontogeny of these behaviours.I will meet my aim by experimentally test how birds in flight are affected by solar radiation (WP I; year 1 & 2) and from this improve a heat transfer model for birds in flight.

By using novel multisensor dataloggers I will track the activity, geographical patterns and altitudinal behaviour of migratory birds to elucidate how migrants deal with the risk of overheating and the ontogeny of migratory behaviours (WP II; year 3 – 4 fieldwork from year 1).

In addition, I will test the developed heat transfer model in free-flying birds and disentangle the costs and benefits of altitudinal behaviour by using dataloggers that also measures body temperature, ambient temperature and solar radiation (WPIII; year 3 – 4 fieldwork from year 2).

The project will take place at Lund University, which has a world leading role in animal migration research.By achieving the aims in this proposal we will gain an all new understanding of limitations and possibilities of long migratory flights.

This knowledge is essential to understand limitations of a migratory flights, and how migratory birds can be predicted to be able to cope with future habitat changes (e.g., increased desertification).