title: Body shrinkage due to Arctic warming reduces red knot fitness in tropical wintering range.
abstract: Reductions in body size are increasingly being identified as a response to climate warming. Here we present evidence for a case of such body shrinkage, potentially due to malnutrition in early life. We show that an avian long-distance migrant (red knot, Calidris canutus canutus), which is experiencing globally unrivaled warming rates at its high-Arctic breeding grounds, produces smaller offspring with shorter bills during summers with early snowmelt. This has consequences half a world away at their tropical wintering grounds, where shorter-billed individuals have reduced survival rates. This is associated with these molluscivores eating fewer deeply buried bivalve prey and more shallowly buried seagrass rhizomes. We suggest that seasonal migrants can experience reduced fitness at one end of their range as a result of a changing climate at the other end.
authors.affiliation: Department of Coastal Systems, NIOZ Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research, and Utrecht University, Post Office Box 59, 1790 AB Den Burg (Texel), Netherlands.
authors.forename: Jan A
authors.initials: JA
authors.lastname: van Gils
authors.affiliation: Centre for Integrative Ecology, School of Life and Environmental Sciences, Deakin University, Waurn Ponds Campus, Victoria 3217, Australia.
authors.forename: Simeon
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Lisovski
authors.affiliation: Conservation Ecology Group, Groningen Institute for Evolutionary Life Sciences (GELIFES), University of Groningen, Post Office Box 11103, 9700 CC Groningen, Netherlands. Centre d'Ecologie Fonctionnelle et Evolutive, Unité Mixte de Recherche 5175, Campus Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, 1919 Route de Mende, 34293 Montpellier Cedex 5, France.
authors.forename: Tamar
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Lok
authors.affiliation: Avian Ecophysiology Unit, Department of Vertebrate Ecology and Zoology, University of Gdańsk, Wita Stwosza 59, 80-308 Gdańsk, Poland.
authors.forename: Włodzimierz
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Meissner
authors.affiliation: Avian Ecophysiology Unit, Department of Vertebrate Ecology and Zoology, University of Gdańsk, Wita Stwosza 59, 80-308 Gdańsk, Poland.
authors.forename: Agnieszka
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Ożarowska
authors.affiliation: Department of Coastal Systems, NIOZ Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research, and Utrecht University, Post Office Box 59, 1790 AB Den Burg (Texel), Netherlands.
authors.forename: Jimmy
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: de Fouw
authors.affiliation: Department of Coastal Systems, NIOZ Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research, and Utrecht University, Post Office Box 59, 1790 AB Den Burg (Texel), Netherlands. Department of Vertebrate Zoology, Lomonosov Moscow State University, Moscow, 119991, Russia.
authors.forename: Eldar
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Rakhimberdiev
authors.affiliation: Department of Vertebrate Zoology, Lomonosov Moscow State University, Moscow, 119991, Russia.
authors.forename: Mikhail Y
authors.initials: MY
authors.lastname: Soloviev
authors.affiliation: Department of Coastal Systems, NIOZ Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research, and Utrecht University, Post Office Box 59, 1790 AB Den Burg (Texel), Netherlands. Conservation Ecology Group, Groningen Institute for Evolutionary Life Sciences (GELIFES), University of Groningen, Post Office Box 11103, 9700 CC Groningen, Netherlands.
authors.forename: Theunis
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Piersma
authors.affiliation: Centre for Integrative Ecology, School of Life and Environmental Sciences, Deakin University, Waurn Ponds Campus, Victoria 3217, Australia.
authors.forename: Marcel
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Klaassen
mesh_terms: D025041:Animal Migration; D000818:Animals; D001110:Arctic Regions; D001502:Beak / Q000002:abnormalities; D049872:Bivalvia; D049628:Body Size; D001947:Breeding; D046091:Charadriiformes / Q000002:abnormalities*; D020387:Food Chain; D056084:Genetic Fitness; D057232:Global Warming; D044342:Malnutrition / Q000150:complications / Q000662:veterinary; D012621:Seasons