Reproductive asynchrony within social groups of female eastern wild turkeys

Coordination in timing of reproduction is driven by multiple ecological and sociobiological processes for a wide array of species. Eastern wild turkeys (Meleagris gallopavo silvestris) use a male dominance polygynous mating system, where males communicate with females via elaborate courtship displays and vocalizations at display sites. Most females prefer to mate with dominant males, therefore asynchronous breeding and nesting may occur which can disproportionately influence individual fitness within breeding groups. For female wild turkeys, there are reproductive advantages associated with earlier nesting. As such, we evaluated reproductive synchrony within and between groups of GPS-tagged female eastern wild turkeys based on timing of nest initiation. We examined 30 social groups with an average of 7 females per group (range 2-15) during 2014-2019 in west central Louisiana. We found that the estimated number of days between first nest initiation across females within groups varied bet..., Capture and handling
We captured female wild turkeys opportunistically in flocks ranging from three to >20 using rocket nets baited with corn from January–March 2014–2019. We aged each individual using the presence of barring on the 9th and 10th primaries (Pelham and Dickson 1992). We fitted all females with a uniquely identifiable aluminum rivet tarsal band and GPS/VHF transmitter (89g; Biotrack Limited, Wareham, Dorset, UK; Guthrie et al. 2011). Transmitters were attached backpack style using marine grade shock cord (3mm), which typically degraded after several years and fell off the birds if they were not recovered dead. We programmed GPS units to collect data at 1-hour intervals (Cohen et al. 2018) between 05:00 to 20:00 daily with one location at night (23:59:58) to identify roosts until the battery died or the unit was recovered. We immediately released individuals at the capture location following processing. Capture, handling, and marking procedures were approved by the Louis...,