Disturbance increases high tide travel distance of a roosting shorebird but only marginally affects daily energy expenditure

Anthropogenic disturbance can negatively affect an animal’s energy budget by evoking movement responses. Existing research focuses mainly on immediate displacement as a disturbance effect, since this can be easily observed in the field. However, effects on movement over longer timescales are poorly examined and it is largely unknown if and to what extent they reflect immediate responses. Longer-term responses could for example be larger than immediate responses if birds, after disturbance, return to the original location and thereby travel twice the immediate disturbed distance. We combined GPS tracking data with observational data to quantify the effects of anthropogenic (air force and walkers) and non-anthropogenic disturbances on distances travelled by roosting Eurasian Oystercatchers (Haematopus ostralegus) during the non-breeding season. We compared immediate displacement after a disturbance with distance travelled during the entire high tide period (longer-term response), while ac...