Individual quality and phenology mediate the effect of radioactive contamination on body temperature in Chernobyl barn swallows

Abstract

Anthropogenic stressors, such as radioactive contaminants released from the Chernobyl and Fukushima Daiichi accidents, deteriorate ecological and evolutionary processes, as evidence for damaging effects of radioactive contamination on wildlife is accumulating. Yet little is known about physiological traits of animals inhabiting contaminated areas, and how those are affected by individual quality and phenology. We investigated variation in body temperature of wild barn swallows, Hirundo rustica, exposed to radioactive contamination from the Chernobyl accident in Ukraine and Belarus. We tested whether exposure to variable levels of radioactive contamination modified core body temperature of birds, and whether individual and phenological characteristics modulated radiosensitivity of body temperature. We showed that barn swallow body temperature varied with exposure to environmental radioactive contamination and that individual characteristics and phenology affected radioactive exposure. Increased radiosensitivity and up-regulation of body temperature were detected in birds of low body condition, high risk of capture, and in animals captured late during the day but early during the season. These results highlight the complex ways that the body temperature of a wild bird is impacted by exposure to increased radioactive contamination in natural habitats. By impacting body temperature, increased radioactive contamination may compromise energetic balance, jeopardize responsiveness to global warming, and increase risk of overheating.