Personality, Foraging and Fitness Consequences in a Long Lived Seabird

While personality differences in animals are defined as consistent behavioural variation between individuals, the widely studied field of foraging specialisation in marine vertebrates has rarely been addressed within this framework. However there is much overlap between the two fields, both aiming to measure the causes and consequences of consistent individual behaviour. Here for the first time we use both a classic measure of personality, the response to a novel object, and an estimate of foraging strategy, derived from GPS data, to examine individual personality differences in black browed albatross and their consequences for fitness. First, we examine the repeatability of personality scores and link these to variation in foraging habitat. Bolder individuals forage nearer the colony, in shallower regions, whereas shyer birds travel further from the colony, and fed in deeper oceanic waters. Interestingly, neither personality score predicted a bird’s overlap with fisheries. Second, we show that both personality scores are correlated with fitness consequences, dependent on sex and year quality. Our data suggest that shyer males and bolder females have higher fitness, but the strength of this relationship depends on year quality. Females who forage further from the colony have higher breeding success in poor quality years, whereas males foraging close to the colony always have higher fitness. Together these results highlight the potential importance of personality variation in seabirds and that the fitness consequences of boldness and foraging strategy may be highly sex dependent.尽管动物人格差异被定义为个体间稳定的行为变异，但海洋脊椎动物觅食特化这一广受研究的领域，却极少在该框架下得到探讨。不过这两个研究领域存在大量重合之处，二者均旨在探究个体稳定行为的成因与后果。本研究首次同时采用经典的人格测量方法——对新奇物体的反应——以及基于GPS数据推导的觅食策略评估，来探究黑眉信天翁的个体人格差异及其对适合度的影响。首先，本研究考察了人格得分的可重复性，并将其与觅食生境的变异相关联：大胆个体的觅食区域距繁殖群落更近，且位于较浅水域；而害羞个体则会飞行更远距离，在更深的远洋水域觅食。值得注意的是，两种人格得分均无法预测个体与渔业活动的重叠范围。其次，本研究表明，两种人格得分均与适合度后果相关，且该相关性受性别与年度环境质量的调控；本研究数据显示，害羞的雄性与大胆的雌性拥有更高的适合度，但这种关联的强度取决于年度环境质量。在年度环境较差的年份，觅食距离繁殖群落更远的雌性具有更高的繁殖成功率；而觅食距离繁殖群落较近的雄性则始终拥有更高的适合度。综上，本研究结果凸显了人格变异在海鸟研究中的潜在重要性，同时表明大胆性与觅食策略的适合度后果可能存在极强的性别依赖性。