Consequences of space sharing on individual phenotypes in the New Zealand hihi
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Consequences of space sharing on individual phenotypes in the New Zealand hihi A. Rutschmann1 · P. de Villemereuil1,2 · P. Brekke3 · J. G. Ewen3 · N. Anderson4 · A. W. Santure1 Received: 11 December 2019 / Accepted: 24 July 2020 © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020
Abstract In heterogeneous habitats, individuals sharing a larger part of their home-range are also likely to live in a very similar environment. This ‘common environment’ effect can generate phenotypic similarities between neighbours and lead to the structuring of phenotypes through the habitat. In this study, we used an intensely monitored population of hihi (or stitchbird, Notiomystis cincta) from New Zealand, to assess whether home-range overlap and genetic relatedness between birds could generate phenotypic resemblance for a wide panel of morphological and life-history traits. Using a multiple-matrix animal model approach to partition the phenotypic variance present in the population, we included a spatial matrix measuring home range overlap between birds and estimated the proportion of variance attributable to space sharing. We detected a clear contribution of space sharing to the overall phenotypic similarity for two traits: hatchling mass and laying date. We also confirmed the very low estimates of genetic heritability already found for this species. These results suggest that models including space sharing can offer further insight into the determinants of individual differences in phenotype. In particular, the spatial matrix helps to capture fine-scale variation of the environment that classic animal models would potentially miss or miss-assign. In this species, results also suggest that small but significant genetic heritability estimates are not upwardly biased by clustering of close relatives in space. Keywords Stitchbird · Animal model · Spatial matrix · Heritability · Common environment · Phenotypic variation
Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (https://doi.org/10.1007/s1068 2-020-10063-z) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. * A. Rutschmann [email protected] 1
School of Biological Sciences, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
2
Institut de Systématique, Évolution, Biodiversité (ISYEB), École Pratique des Hautes Études | PSL, MNHN, CNRS, Sorbonne Université, Université des Antilles, Paris, France
3
Institute of Zoology, Zoological Society of London, Regents Park, London, UK
4
Zealandia Sanctuary, Wellington, New Zealand
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Vol.:(0123456789)
Evolutionary Ecology
Introduction The distribution of animals in their habitat is not random, with most individuals restricting their movements to their home-range, a relatively confined area where they conduct daily tasks to survive and reproduce (Burt 1943; Börger et al. 2008). Home-ranges of conspecifics often overlap, and it is not unusual that several individuals simultaneously use the same characteristics of their habitat, with or without direct interactions (Brown and Orians 1970; Bö
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