Data from: Parameterizing the robust design in the BUGS language: lifetime carry‐over effects of environmental conditions during growth on a long‐lived bird

1. Since the initial development of the robust design, this
capture‐recapture model structure has been modified to estimate temporary
emigration, and expanded to include auxiliary information such as band
recovery and live resight data using maximum likelihood approaches. These
developments have allowed investigators to separately assess individual
and group effects on true survival, site fidelity, and temporary
emigration. Additionally, recent advances in the BUGS language have
allowed researchers to develop increasingly complex, user‐specified models
in Bayesian frameworks. 2. The robust design has rarely been implemented
in the BUGS language, and previous attempts to parameterize the robust
design in BUGS exhibited strong bias in estimates of temporary emigration
rates. Given the limitations of current parameterizations of the robust
design in Bayesian frameworks, and our research objectives, we have
developed a parameterization of the robust design in the BUGS language
that produces unbiased estimates of all model parameters. 3. We use this
novel model structure to examine lifetime carry‐over effects of
environmental conditions during early life on annual breeding
probabilities of Pacific black brent (Branta bernicla nigricans) breeding
on the Yukon‐Kuskokwim River Delta in western Alaska. We found that
individuals that were more structurally developed as goslings bred at
increased rates as adults (β = 0.14, f = 0.94), with no effect on adult
survival (β = 0.01, f = 0.62). Additionally, we provide evidence for
long‐term declines in apparent survival of breeding adult females at the
population level (β = ‐0.01, f = 0.90). 4. This novel model structure can
be easily expanded (Gibson et al., in review), and has important
implications for population modelling at broad scales, where we apply it
to a declining population of Pacific black brent. Given long‐term declines
in gosling growth on the Yukon‐Kuskokwim Delta, we predict future declines
in population trajectories as a result of lifetime carry‐over effects of
environmental conditions during growth on adult fecundity, and long‐term
declines in adult survival.