# New solutions for Parker sperm competition model

Parker et al. (2013) created a general model for sperm allocation under a trade-off between male investment of resources $$R$$ into pre-copulatory effort (e.g. search time) $$T$$ versus post-copulatory effort (e.g. ejaculate) $$U$$. Their model is interesting because it encompasses a range of different scenarios of female remating and the type of competition between males. For female remating scenarios, the risk model has females mating … Continue reading New solutions for Parker sperm competition model

# Playing with a new model for fugitive coexistence

I recently read a paper by Kawecki (2017), which presents a new mechanism for something analogous to fugitive coexistence. The paper has a really great literature overview, which I won’t be able to do justice here. In short, fugitive coexistence is when an inferior species persists on a patchy landscape by being a better coloniser: when a local extinction occurs, they are quicker to arrive … Continue reading Playing with a new model for fugitive coexistence

# Fixation probability of birth-death process

The goal is to understand where Eq. 2 of the Supplementary section of Sigmund et al. (2010) came from. We are considering a finite population within which individuals are pursuing different game-theoretic strategies. At each timestep, a pair of individuals is chosen at random, and they engage in a social learning process, where individual $$i$$ will adopt the strategy of individual $$j$$ according … Continue reading Fixation probability of birth-death process

# Two new papers about blue tits on Corsica

I recently read two new papers about blue tits in Corsica: Dubuc-Messier et al. (2017 Behav. Ecol.), and Dubuc-Messier et al. (2018 Evol. Biol.). The 2018 paper was interested in whether the differences between the evergreen and deciduous ecotypes on Corsica were genetic or a plastic response to the different habitat types. They took 7-12 day old nestlings and raised them in a common garden, … Continue reading Two new papers about blue tits on Corsica

# Carryover effects and local adaptation

What allows a population in a heterogeneous landscape to become locally adapted? In general, adaptation to a rare habitat type is difficult because divergent selection is counter-acted by the homogenising effects of gene-flow. However adaptation to a rare habitat type may occur if it has a higher quality, so that a greater number of offspring can be produced there, to compensate for its relative rarity … Continue reading Carryover effects and local adaptation

# Ecology of information

Collaborators: Kenneth Schmidt, Jacob Johansson, François Massol, Niclas Jonzen. Breeding birds subject to nest-predation will attempt to choose a high quality nesting site with a low density of predators. For example, when recordings of chipmunk calls are played in the forest, ovenbirds will nest away from where the recordings are playing (Eureka Alert). Often models assume perfect information, so that sites are filled from highest … Continue reading Ecology of information

# Bad for birds, good for squirrels

Here’s a nice video I stumbled upon about Lisa Aubry’s group’s work at Utah State Uni. Climate change is having a positive effect on uinta ground squirrels, allowing them to fatten-up and attain weights higher than those recorded historically. This population is survival limited, and survival probability is higher the fatter the squirrels are, so abundance responds positively to this climate change. I can’t handle … Continue reading Bad for birds, good for squirrels

# Lightning talk on migratory bird phenology

A lightning talk for our latest paper: Kristensen, Nadiah P., Jacob Johansson, Jörgen Ripa, and Niclas Jonzén. 2015. “Phenology of two interdependent traits in migratory birds in response to climate change.” Proceedings of the Royal Society B Continue reading Lightning talk on migratory bird phenology

# On phenology and bet-hedging

Environmental fluctuations may cause natural selection to favor phenologies that systematically deviate from the resource maximizing strategy. In temporally variable environments, because fitness is taken from the geometric (not arithmetic) mean growth rate (Gillespie, 1974), this permits the evolution of bet-hedging strategies (Simons, 2011), which are strategies that maximises total fitness by reducing temporal variation at the cost of arithmetic mean fitness (Ripa et al. … Continue reading On phenology and bet-hedging

# The interesting case of blue tits in France

I’ve recently been reading about a several decade long study centred around blue tits in France and on the island of Corsica. The work is being carried out by a group in the evolutionary ecology unit at the Centre D’Ecologie Fonctionnelle & Evolutive and it crosses over all kinds of interesting areas of ecology and evolution. The mainland study area is dominated by deciduous habitat … Continue reading The interesting case of blue tits in France