Keywords
Conspecific Attraction
Tarsus Length
Traditional Aggregation. Western Ghats.
How to Cite
Abstract
Colonial breeding may be driven by patchy breeding habitats leading to congregation of individuals at suitable sites, or by conspeciftc attraction, where individuals choose to nest in the proximity of past or present nesting sites of conspecifics. The selection of habitat might also be influenced by age and body condition. Chestnut-headed Bee-eaters Merops leschenaulti (CHB) breed solitarily and in small colonies. Data on nesting pairs and nests were collected over five months from December 2010 to May 2011 during the breeding season in Haliyal and Karwar Forest Division, Uttara Kannada district, Karnataka. A total of 17 nests were found during the course of the study, distributed in three colonies and five solitary nesting sites. We measured and compared habitat characteristics of nests at solitary and colonial breeding sites and found no significant difference between habitat characteristics at solitary and colonial nests. We also found that colonial nesting birds were slightly larger than solitary ones. There is some evidence pointing at despotism and the role of the previous year’s nest holes in CHB nesting behaviour, and further investigations are required to validate the hypothesis.References
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