Experience counts: the role of female age in morning incubation and brooding behavior in relation to temperature

Reproductive experience can impact how individuals allocate time and energy to reproduction and generate differences in reproductive behavior that leads to experience dependent variation in reproductive success. In order to understand if individual variation in parental behavior is related to environmental temperature and breeding experience, we observed the timing and duration of the first morning off bout in a wild, open cup nesting passerine bird during the incubation and early nestling period. We compared incubation behaviors and nest temperature of inexperienced (second year = first breeding season) and experienced (after second year) female hooded warblers Setophaga citrina. Females left the nest earlier on colder mornings suggesting an energetic constraint due to the long overnight on bout during colder temperatures. During incubation, females increased the duration of the first morning off bout with increasing temperature. Similarly, during the early nestling period, experienced...