Evolvability of breeding phenology in birds: predicting the evolutionary consequences of climate change

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There is great scientific interest in monitoring, understanding and predicting the ecological consequences, with a series of high-profile studies having demonstrated shifts in the geographic distribution of species, the stability of populations, and the timing of biological events. To date, however, these studies have typically focussed on the current ecology of populations and have necessarily had to ignore the potential for species to evolve in response to climate change. The overall aim of this study is to understand the extent to which, and the speed with which, populations can be expected to evolve in response to climate change. The study is based on a classic example of the ecological consequences of climate change, namely the association between global warming and the earlier onset of breeding activity in a wild population of European birds. Several recent studies have demonstrated this 'early spring' phenomenon in temperate populations, but as yet there have been relatively few detailed studies of the individual fitness consequences of changes in the timing of breeding or the speed with which populations can be expected to evolve to cope with a changing climate. This project will overcome these shortfalls by combining experimental field manipulations of breeding phenology with a long-term pedigree on a wild populations of a passerine bird. By experimentally advancing and delaying the timing of breeding of individual birds we will (i) reveal the long-term fitness consequences of mismatches between breeding phenology and prey availability, (ii) identify the extent of individual optimization in breeding phenology and synchrony with prey availability, and (iii) test for interactions between breeding date and clutch size. Then, by using our existing genetic pedigree and information on cross-fostering off offspring between nests, we will (iv) estimate the extent to which the ability to cope with mismatches between breeding phenology and prey availability are determined by genetic factors, and (v) estimate the rate at which the population will be able to evolve in response to ongoing environmental change. This project tackles one of NERC's main research priorities, namely predicting the ecological consequences of climate change. The project also investigates factors that determine long-term resilience to environmental change, which are an important part of NERC's focus on the maintenance of biodiversity in complex natural systems.