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Our paper that describes basic features of senescence has been accepted for publication Journal of Avian Biology. With the lightning-fast turnarounds and early views that the public is now granted to scientific articles, you can search for the paper and read an advance copy…months before copy-editing and proofing of the final version is done. Let me know if you find any typos!Screen Shot 2017-03-10 at 12.47.06 PM

The paper describes findings that I have been blogging about for some months now. First, both sexes of loons senesce (begin to die at a high rate) once they reach their mid-20s. Second, at first blush it seems that the sexes do not differ substantially in the senescence pattern. Third, this paper looks only at territory holders, which are the creme de la creme of adult loons, because they have not only survived to adulthood, but also claimed a territory and produced chicks there. Thus, this group of birds analyzed does not include the many adults who tried but failed to settle on a territory or settled briefly but did not reproduce. Fourth, old males (but not females) suffer a decline in territory resettlement after being evicted from a territory. Finally, we present in the paper preliminary evidence that suggests male might increase or at least maintain high breeding success at advanced age, while it seems that females fall into reproductive decline. So there is a glimmer of possible terminal investment by males (increased investment by animals near death) at which this paper hints. If you have followed my blog, you know that we have data from a separate analysis that deals more directly with the possibility of terminal investment by males.

That is all I have for now. I have just finished hiring the four field staff members for this year. They are a strong bunch and include one of our seasoned hands from 2016. Since we are on the verge of ice-out already, I have gotten the crew hired none too soon. By the time most of us arrive in May, nesting will be well underway. No matter. We are accustomed to scrambling to keep up with the loons.

See you out on the lakes!

 

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Publishing papers in scientific journals is hard work. It requires patient and well-planned data collection, thoughtful statistical analysis, and painstaking writing and editing of a manuscript. And then the real work begins! Among the dozens of scientific journals that might publish the paper, one must select a journal that suits the topic of the paper, employs competent editors and reviewers, and makes its published papers available to a wide audience so that it will be read and cited by many colleagues in one’s field. Most crucial, one must convince the journal’s anonymous reviewers that the findings reported in the paper are robust and valuable. In short, publishing a paper is a journey.

Recently, we completed a successful journey, as our paper describing the process of territory settlement in young loons was accepted by Animal Behaviour. Although we would like to celebrate this event, we are more relieved than joyous; relieved because the paper represents a vast amount of field work, number-crunching and writing and became long and unwieldy enough that it earned harsh criticisms from some reviewers. So its publication became, as some journeys do, a story of survival in the face of adversity.

The paper will make available a trove of valuable findings. We report in the paper that young loons do not adhere to the most prominent model for territory settlement. This idea, termed the “foothold model”, maintains that young animals in search of breeding territories target a small set of established territories for intrusions, gradually gain confidence through increased familiarity with that limited set of territories, and then evict the owner of one of those territories (or outcompete another young loon for the vacancy, in the event of the owner’s death) in order to claim the territory as their own.  We show in our paper that, instead of using a foothold of this kind to gain a territory, young loons merely settle on a territory that is similar to their natal one. In some cases, they are able to occupy a vacant territory and breed there. In other cases, they wait to mature and improve in body condition and then evict an owner. But the repeated intrusions that young loons make to specific lakes are not attempts to build upon their familiarity with the lake and thereby increase their competitive ability there.  Rather, they are efforts to assess the fighting ability and perhaps the motivation of the current owner to defend its territory so that the young loon can judge when an attempted eviction is likely to be successful.  Reviewers described our findings as “provocative” within our field, and we hope they are right!

Thanks to all our supporters, especially landowners and friends, who allowed us to study their loons year after year. Publication of this meaty paper is evidence that our mutual investment in loon research is paying off.