Martyna Syposz

• DPhil
• PostDoc Position at University of Gdańsk

Long-distance migrants must optimise their timing of breeding to capitalise on resources at both breeding and over-wintering sites. In species with protracted breeding seasons, departing earlier on migration might be advantageous, but is constrained by the ongoing breeding attempt. Here we investigated how breeding timing affects migratory strategi...

Large-scale climatic fluctuations, such as the El Niño–Southern Oscillation, can have dramatic effects on ocean ecosystem productivity. Many mobile species breeding in temperate or higher latitudes escape the extremes of seasonal climate variation through long-distance, even trans-global migration, but how they deal with, or are affected by, such l...

Recognizing the deviation in an animal’s behavior from a population mean is not only necessary to understand the evolution and stability of the whole system but also to predict the future of a population in a changing environment. Arctic seabirds are expected to exhibit high synchronization in timing of breeding at the population level, due to high...

An alloparent is an individual that cares for a young individual, but it is not its genetic parent. This behaviour is known in many species of animals, but some groups are still underreported. Here, we documented, in camera footage, the alloparental feeding of two chicks of the little auk, a crevice-nesting seabird. This is the first evidence of th...

Manx Shearwaters Puffinus puffinus, like other procellariiform seabirds, spend most of their lives at sea and are encountered on land only when breeding at colonies or if they are grounded due to unfavourable weather conditions or exposure to artificial light. Here, we used historical ringing data to explore the age class structure and spatial patt...

Dynamic soaring harvests energy from a spatiotemporal wind gradient, allowing albatrosses to glide over vast distances. However, its use is challenging to demonstrate empirically and has yet to be confirmed in other seabirds. Here, we investigate how flap-gliding Manx shearwaters optimize their flight for dynamic soaring. We do so by deriving a new...

For many bird species, trade-offs in resource allocation become stark during incubation, when caring demands put into direct conflict their investment in reproduction versus survival. We demonstrate the critical importance of resource allocation, here measured indirectly as body mass, for incubation behavior in the Manx Shearwater (Puffinus puffinu...

Dynamic soaring harvests energy from a spatiotemporal wind gradient, allowing albatrosses to glide over vast distances. However, its use is challenging to demonstrate empirically, and has yet to be confirmed in other seabirds. Here we investigate how flap-gliding Manx Shearwaters optimise their flight for dynamic soaring. We do so by deriving a new...

The cognitive processes (learning and processing of information) underpinning the long-distance navigation of birds are poorly understood. Here, we used the homing motivation of the Manx shearwater to investigate navigational decision making in a wild bird by displacing them 294 km to the far side of a large island (the island of Ireland). Since sh...

Many species that provide care for their offspring in tandem with a partner coordinate their activities to maximise the efficiency of their investment. However, it is not well known exactly how this coordination is achieved. Manx shearwaters Puffinus puffinus are Procellariiform seabirds that exhibit a dual foraging strategy during chick provisioni...

There is increasing evidence for impacts of light pollution on the physiology and behaviour of wild animals. Nocturnally active Procellariiform seabirds are often found grounded in areas polluted by light and struggle to take to the air again without human intervention. Hence, understanding their responses to different wavelengths and intensities o...

Seabirds care for their offspring in remote breeding colonies where foraging sites are distant and may be unpredictable, and where chicks are left unaccompanied for extended periods during their parents’ foraging trips, leaving them vulnerable to predation or starvation. One way to mitigate this risk is for individuals to coordinate parenting dutie...

As more and more species face anthropogenic threats, understanding the causes of population declines in vulnerable taxa is essential. However, long‐term datasets, ideal to identify lasting or indirect effects on fitness measures such as those caused by environmental factors, are not always available. Here we use a single year but multi‐population a...

The first solitary migration of juvenile birds is difficult to study because of a low juvenile survival rates and sometimes long delays in return to the breeding grounds. Consequently, little is known about this crucial life event for many bird species, in particular the sensory guidance mechanisms facilitating the first migratory journey. Initial...

Biologging has emerged as one of the most powerful and widely used technologies in ethology and ecology, providing unprecedented insight into animal behaviour. However, attaching loggers to animals may alter their behaviour, leading to the collection of data that fails to represent natural activity accurately. This is of particular concern in free-...

Small island states receive unprecedented amounts of the world's plastic waste. In March 2019, we removed as much plastic litter as possible from Aldabra Atoll, a remote UNESCO World Heritage Site, and estimated the money and effort required to remove the remaining debris. We removed 25 tonnes at a cost of $224,537, which equates to around $10,000...

Grounding of thousands of newly fledged petrels and shearwaters (family Procellariidae) in built-up areas due to artificial light is a global problem. Due to their anatomy these grounded birds find it difficult to take off from built-up areas, and many fall victim to predation, cars, dehydration or starvation. This research investigated a combinati...

Compass orientation is central to the control of animal movement from the scale of local food-caching movements around a familiar area in parids [1] and corvids [2, 3] to the first autumn vector navigation of songbirds embarking on long-distance migration [4-6]. In the study of diurnal birds, where the homing pigeon, Columba livia, has been the mai...

Understanding the detrimental effects of anthropogenic light on nocturnally mobile animals is a long-standing problem in conservation biology. Seabirds such as shearwaters and petrels can be especially affected, perhaps because of their propensity to fly close to the surface, making them vulnerable to encountering anthropogenic light sources. We in...