The partitioning of temporal movement patterns of breeding red-crowned crane (Grus japonensis) induced by temperature

Abstract

Patterns of movement through time are important components of animal behavior and key to understanding animal ecology. Due to methodological challenges, including tracing and analyzing movements and their changes, they are seldom studied to identify both seasonal patterns and their driving forces. Using seven GPS-collared red-crowned cranes (Grus japonensis, RCCs), we recorded their moving distances and concurrent climatic data to analyze the relative importance of these factors in RCC movements. Temperature was identified as the most important of these climatic variables in RCC movements. Based on temperature dependence and researcher expertise, we determined RCC temporal movement patterns as mating, brooding, wading, and growing with specific temporal periods partitioning. With the distance quantile of movement, we also identified the preferred temperature ranges in each temporal pattern. The four specific temporal partitionings of breeding movement and their preferred temperature ranges can effectively help wildlife managers devise conservation budgets and allocate resources. Our study provides a robust methodology in the partitioning of avian temporal movement patterns and further the understanding of animal behavior ecology, which is applicable to the study and conservation of other species, as well as for RCCs.