Cooperative breeding alters physiological and behavioral responses to habitat fragmentation

Beate Apfelbeck; Laurence Cousseau; Gladys Nyakeru Kung'u; Virginie Canoine; Janne Heiskanen; David K Korir; Fredrick Lala; Petri Pellikka; Mwangi Githiru; Luc Lens

doi:10.1016/j.isci.2023.108717

Cooperative breeding alters physiological and behavioral responses to habitat fragmentation

iScience. 2024 Jan 9;27(1):108717. doi: 10.1016/j.isci.2023.108717. eCollection 2024 Jan 19.

Authors

Beate Apfelbeck^{1

2}, Laurence Cousseau^{3

2}, Gladys Nyakeru Kung'u^{1

2}, Virginie Canoine⁴, Janne Heiskanen^{5

6}, David K Korir⁷, Fredrick Lala⁷, Petri Pellikka^{5

8

9}, Mwangi Githiru^{10

2}, Luc Lens³

Affiliations

¹ Evolutionary Zoology Group, Department of Environment and Biodiversity, University of Salzburg, Hellbrunnerstr. 34, 5020 Salzburg, Austria.
² Zoology Department, National Museums of Kenya, Museum Hill Road, Nairobi 00100, Kenya.
³ Terrestrial Ecology Unit, Department of Biology, Ghent University, K. L. Ledeganckstraat 35, 9000 Ghent, Belgium.
⁴ Department of Behavioral and Cognitive Biology, University of Vienna, Djerassiplatz 1, 1030 Vienna, Austria.
⁵ Department of Geosciences and Geography, University of Helsinki, P.O. Box 64, 00014 Helsinki, Finland.
⁶ Finnish Meteorological Institute, P.O. Box 503, 00101 Helsinki, Finland.
⁷ Wildlife Research and Training Institute, P.O. Box 842, Naivasha 20117, Kenya.
⁸ University of Nairobi, Wangari Maathai Institute for Environmental and Peace Studies, P.O. Box 29053, Kangemi 00625, Kenya.
⁹ State Key Laboratory for Information Engineering in Surveying, Mapping and Remote Sensing, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430079, China.
¹⁰ Wildlife Works, P.O. Box 310, Voi 80300, Kenya.

Abstract

Animals respond to habitat alteration with changes in their behavior and physiology. These changes determine individual performance and thus precede changes in population size. They are therefore hypothesized to provide important insights into how animals cope with environmental change. Here, we investigated physiological and behavioral responses of a cooperatively breeding bird, the placid greenbul (Phyllastrephus placidus), in a severely fragmented tropical biodiversity hotspot and combined these data with remotely sensed (LiDAR) environmental data. We found that individuals had increased glucocorticoid hormone levels when breeding in territories with low native canopy cover or located within small fragments. However, when breeding with the help of subordinates, breeders in low quality territories had similar glucocorticoid levels as those in higher quality territories. Our study shows that sociality may impact how well animals cope with environmental change and contributes to our understanding of the role of glucocorticoid physiology and behavior in response to anthropogenic change.

Keywords: Ecology; Evolutionary biology; Evolutionary ecology; Ornithology; Physiology.