Survival rates of Puerto Rican birds: Are islands really that different

Abstract

The comparison of tropical birds having small clutches and long lifespans with temperate birds having large clutches and short lifespans is one of the cornerstones of theories dealing with avian reproductive strategies (Cody 1966, 1971, Stearns 1976, Ricklefs 1983, 1992, Murray 1985, Skutch 1985, Godfray et al. 1991). Karr et al. (1990) described the limited data supporting the assumption of long tropical lifespans and provided data for one sample of tropical birds--25 species from Panama--that did not show greater survivorship than a sample of temperate species (10 from Maryland). Their paper provides one of the first comparisons of long-term data from sets of species from two regions with survival rate estimates computed using capture-recapture models developed in recent years to permit inferences unconfounded by sampling probabilities (Pollock et al. 1990)

Citation

Faaborg, John; Arendt, Wayne J. 1995. Survival rates of Puerto Rican birds: Are islands really that different? Auk 112:503-507.