Is parental care a constraint on the habitat use of common Eider females?

Abstract

The aim of this study was to investigate how parental care in Common Eider (Somateria mollissima) females affected their habitat selection. I compared the post-nesting behavior of brood-caring females and females without young. Females that cared for ducklings and females without young moved similar distances from the nesting colony to the feeding areas. However, throughout the brood rearing season, females without young undertook longer secondary movements than brood-caring females. The type of feeding habitat used and the feeding mode were similar among the different female categories, and all females that had attempted to nest foraged in the intertidal zone by dabbling. This study suggests that in a large sea duck like the Common Eider, with highly developed ducklings at hatching, parental care does not constrain habitat use very much compared to females without young.