| trichomoniasis in a bonelli's eagle population in spain. | during 1980-97, trichomoniasis was detected in nestlings of bonelli's eagle hieraaetus fasciatus in catalonia (spain). in 1993 trichomonas gallinae was isolated in 36% of nestlings (n = 39) and affected 41% of broods (n = 22). overall, trichomoniasis was one of the most important single nestling mortality factor, accounting for 22% of total chick mortality, and causing the death of 2% of chicks. trichomoniasis deaths took place during the second half of the nestling period. the median age at dea ... | 2000 | 10682745 |
| species variation in osmotic, cryoprotectant, and cooling rate tolerance in poultry, eagle, and peregrine falcon spermatozoa. | potential factors influencing spermatozoa survival to cryopreservation and thawing were analyzed across a range of the following avian species: domestic chicken (gallus domesticus), domestic turkey (meleagris gallopavo), golden eagle (aquila chrysaetos), bonelli's eagle (hieraaetus fasciatus), imperial eagle (aquila adalberti), and peregrine falcon (falco peregrinus). studies focused on spermatozoa tolerance to the following: 1) osmotic stress, 2) different extracellular concentrations of the cr ... | 2000 | 10993841 |
| producing progeny from endangered birds of prey: treatment of urine-contaminated semen and a novel intramagnal insemination approach. | wild raptors brought into an ex situ environment often have poor semen quality that is further compromised by urine contamination. generally, it is believed that in birds, artificial insemination into the cloaca or caudal vagina of females requires large doses of high-quality spermatozoa to maximize fertility. in an effort to define and overcome some of the challenges associated with reproduction in wild raptors, the objectives of this study were to 1) evaluate the frequency, impact, and remedia ... | 2002 | 12216788 |
| spatial variation of mercury levels in nesting bonelli's eagles from southwest portugal: effects of diet composition and prey contamination. | mercury (hg) was determined in adult bonelli's eagles (hieraaetus fasciatus) and their avian prey, from samples of feathers collected between 1992 and 2001 at the nesting sites of 21 pairs in southwest portugal. eagle hg levels showed great variation, reflecting primarily differences in diet composition and food chain biomagnification. concentrations were positively correlated with the dietary proportion of insectivorous and omnivorous birds (e.g. egrets, corvids and thrushes), with very low lev ... | 2005 | 15620600 |
| plasma b-esterase activities in european raptors. | b-esterases are serine hydrolases composed of cholinesterases, including acetylcholinesterase (ache) and butyrylcholinesterase (bche), and carboxylesterase (cbe). these esterases, found in blood plasma, are inhibited by organophosphorus (op) and carbamate (cb) insecticides and can be used as nondestructive biomarkers of exposure to anticholinesterase insecticides. furthermore, b-esterases are involved in detoxification of these insecticides. in order to establish the level of these enzymes and t ... | 2005 | 15827224 |
| serosurvey of west nile virus and other flaviviruses of the japanese encephalitis antigenic complex in birds from andalusia, southern spain. | abstract flaviviruses of the japanese encephalitis virus (jev) antigenic complex, including west nile virus (wnv), are recognized as emerging and reemerging pathogens. circulation of flaviviruses has been recently detected in different mosquito and vertebrate species in several european countries. a serosurvey study was carried out to evaluate the circulation of wnv and other flaviviruses of the jev antigenic complex in different wild bird species in spain between 2006 and 2009. seropositiviy ag ... | 2010 | 21142954 |
| laying the foundations for a human-predator conflict solution: assessing the impact of bonelli's eagle on rabbits and partridges. | predation may potentially lead to negative effects on both prey (directly via predators) and predators (indirectly via human persecution). predation pressure studies are, therefore, of major interest in the fields of theoretical knowledge and conservation of prey or predator species, with wide ramifications and profound implications in human-wildlife conflicts. however, detailed works on this issue in highly valuable -in conservation terms- mediterranean ecosystems are virtually absent. this pap ... | 2011 | 21818399 |
| Predator-prey relationships in a Mediterranean vertebrate system: Bonelli's eagles, rabbits and partridges. | How predators impact on prey population dynamics is still an unsolved issue for most wild predator-prey communities. When considering vertebrates, important concerns constrain a comprehensive understanding of the functioning of predator-prey relationships worldwide; e.g. studies simultaneously quantifying 'functional' and 'numerical responses' (i.e., the 'total response') are rare. The functional, the numerical, and the resulting total response (i.e., how the predator per capita intake, the popu ... | 2011 | 21947548 |
| seropositivity and risk factors associated with toxoplasma gondii infection in wild birds from spain. | toxoplasma gondii is a zoonotic intracellular protozoan parasite of worldwide distribution that infects many species of warm-blooded animals, including birds. to date, there is scant information about the seropositivity of t. gondii and the risk factors associated with t. gondii infection in wild bird populations. in the present study, t. gondii infection was evaluated on sera obtained from 1079 wild birds belonging to 56 species (including falconiformes (n = 610), strigiformes (n = 260), ciconi ... | 2011 | 22216311 |
| permanent genetic resources added to molecular ecology resources database 1 february 2012 - 31 march 2012. | this article documents the addition of 171 microsatellite marker loci and 27 pairs of single nucleotide polymorphism (snp) sequencing primers to the molecular ecology resources database. loci were developed for the following species: bombus pauloensis, cephalorhynchus heavisidii, cercospora sojina, harpyhaliaetus coronatus, hordeum vulgare, lachnolaimus maximus, oceanodroma monteiroi, puccinia striiformis f. sp. tritici, rhea americana, salmo salar, salmo trutta, schistocephalus solidus, sousa p ... | 2012 | 22642264 |
| minimising mortality in endangered raptors due to power lines: the importance of spatial aggregation to optimize the application of mitigation measures. | electrocution by power lines is one of the main causes of non-natural mortality in birds of prey. in an area in central spain, we surveyed 6304 pylons from 333 power lines to determine electrocution rates, environmental and design factors that may influence electrocution and the efficacy of mitigation measures used to minimise electrocution cases. a total of 952 electrocuted raptors, representing 14 different species, were observed. electrocuted raptors were concentrated in certain areas and the ... | 2011 | 22140549 |
| a multi-gene phylogeny of aquiline eagles (aves: accipitriformes) reveals extensive paraphyly at the genus level. | the phylogeny of the tribe aquilini (eagles with fully feathered tarsi) was investigated using 4.2 kb of dna sequence of one mitochondrial (cyt b) and three nuclear loci (rag-1 coding region, ldh intron 3, and adenylate-kinase intron 5). phylogenetic signal was highly congruent and complementary between mtdna and nuclear genes. in addition to single-nucleotide variation, shared deletions in nuclear introns supported one basal and two peripheral clades within the aquilini. monophyly of the aquili ... | 2005 | 15737588 |
| correction: the mitochondrial genomes of aquila fasciata and buteo lagopus (aves, accipitriformes): sequence, structure and phylogenetic analyses. | | 2015 | 26469400 |
| the mitochondrial genomes of aquila fasciata and buteo lagopus (aves, accipitriformes): sequence, structure and phylogenetic analyses. | the family accipitridae is one of the largest groups of non-passerine birds, including 68 genera and 243 species globally distributed. in the present study, we determined the complete mitochondrial sequences of two species of accipitrid, namely aquila fasciata and buteo lagopus, and conducted a comparative mitogenome analysis across the family. the mitogenome length of a. fasciata and b. lagopus are 18,513 and 18,559 bp with an a + t content of 54.2% and 55.0%, respectively. for both the two acc ... | 2015 | 26295156 |
| estimating how inflated or obscured effects of climate affect forecasted species distribution. | climate is one of the main drivers of species distribution. however, as different environmental factors tend to co-vary, the effect of climate cannot be taken at face value, as it may be either inflated or obscured by other correlated factors. we used the favourability models of four species (alytes dickhilleni, vipera latasti, aquila fasciata and capra pyrenaica) inhabiting spanish mountains as case studies to evaluate the relative contribution of climate in their forecasted favourability by us ... | 2013 | 23349726 |
| application of indicator kriging to the complementary use of bioindicators at three trophic levels. | the use of biological indicators is widespread in environmental monitoring, although it has long been recognised that each bioindicator is generally associated with a range of potential limitations and shortcomings. to circumvent this problem, this study adopted the complementary use of bioindicators representing different trophic levels and providing different type of information, in an innovative approach to integrate knowledge and to estimate the overall health state of ecosystems. the approa ... | 2009 | 19477568 |
| phylogeny of eagles, old world vultures, and other accipitridae based on nuclear and mitochondrial dna. | we assessed phylogenetic relationships for birds of prey in the family accipitridae using molecular sequence from two mitochondrial genes (1047 bases nd2 and 1041 bases cyt-b) and one nuclear intron (1074 bases beta-fibrinogen intron 7). we sampled representatives of all 14 accipitridae subfamilies, focusing on four subfamilies of eagles (booted eagles, sea eagles, harpy eagles, and snake eagles) and two subfamilies of old world vultures (gypaetinae and aegypiinae) with nearly all known species ... | 2005 | 15925523 |
| how to plan reintroductions of long-lived birds. | reintroductions have been increasingly used for species restoration and it seems that this conservation tool is going to be more used in the future. nevertheless, there is not a clear consensus about the better procedure for that, consequently a better knowledge of how to optimize this kind of management is needed. here we examined the dynamics of released long-lived bird populations (lesser kestrel, falco naumanni, bonelli's eagle aquila fasciata, and bearded vulture gypaetus barbatus) in objec ... | 2017 | 28445473 |
| the role of conservative versus innovative nesting behavior on the 25-year population expansion of an avian predator. | species ranges often change in relation to multiple environmental and demographic factors. innovative behaviors may affect these changes by facilitating the use of novel habitats, although this idea has been little explored. here, we investigate the importance of behavior during range change, using a 25-year population expansion of bonelli's eagle in southern portugal. this unique population is almost exclusively tree nesting, while all other populations in western europe are predominantly cliff ... | 2017 | 28649337 |
| the influence of diet on nestling body condition of an apex predator: a multi-biomarker approach. | animal body condition refers to the health and physiological state of individuals, and multiple parameters have been proposed to quantify this key concept. food intake is one of the main determinants of individual body condition and much debate has been generated on how diet relates to body condition. we investigated this relationship in free-living bonelli's eagle (aquila fasciata) nestlings sampled at two geographically distant populations in spain. nestlings' main prey consumption was estimat ... | 2016 | 26857272 |
| pollutant accumulation patterns in nestlings of an avian top predator: biochemical and metabolic effects. | the exposure to persistent pollutants such as organochlorine compounds (ocs) or metals has been associated with declines in top predator populations, which can accumulate high amounts of these pollutants from their prey. however, understanding how variation in oc and metal accumulation in wild species affects their biochemical and physiological responses is a big challenge, especially for endangered predators like the bonelli's eagle (aquila fasciata). this bird of prey is an interesting study m ... | 2015 | 26327637 |
| an approach to consider behavioral plasticity as a source of uncertainty when forecasting species' response to climate change. | the rapid ecological shifts that are occurring due to climate change present major challenges for managers and policymakers and, therefore, are one of the main concerns for environmental modelers and evolutionary biologists. species distribution models (sdm) are appropriate tools for assessing the relationship between species distribution and environmental conditions, so being customarily used to forecast the biogeographical response of species to climate change. a serious limitation of species ... | 2015 | 26120426 |
| multi-scale effects of nestling diet on breeding performance in a terrestrial top predator inferred from stable isotope analysis. | inter-individual diet variation within populations is likely to have important ecological and evolutionary implications. the diet-fitness relationships at the individual level and the emerging population processes are, however, poorly understood for most avian predators inhabiting complex terrestrial ecosystems. in this study, we use an isotopic approach to assess the trophic ecology of nestlings in a long-lived raptor, the bonelli's eagle aquila fasciata, and investigate whether nestling dietar ... | 2014 | 24743233 |
| updating known distribution models for forecasting climate change impact on endangered species. | to plan endangered species conservation and to design adequate management programmes, it is necessary to predict their distributional response to climate change, especially under the current situation of rapid change. however, these predictions are customarily done by relating de novo the distribution of the species with climatic conditions with no regard of previously available knowledge about the factors affecting the species distribution. we propose to take advantage of known species distribu ... | 2013 | 23840330 |
| changes in intrapopulation resource use patterns of an endangered raptor in response to a disease-mediated crash in prey abundance. | 1. a long-standing question in ecology is how natural populations respond to a changing environment. emergent optimal foraging theory-based models for individual variation go beyond the population level and predict how its individuals would respond to disturbances that produce changes in resource availability. 2. evaluating variations in resource use patterns at the intrapopulation level in wild populations under changing environmental conditions would allow to further advance in the research on ... | 2012 | 22676770 |
| living on the edge: assessing the extinction risk of critically endangered bonelli's eagle in italy. | the population of bonelli's eagle (aquila fasciata) has declined drastically throughout its european range due to habitat degradation and unnatural elevated mortality. there are less than 1500 breeding pairs accounted for in europe, and the species is currently catalogued as critically endangered in italy, where the 22 territories of sicily, represent nearly 95% of the entire italian population. however, despite national and european conservation concerns, the species currently lacks a specific ... | 2012 | 22662239 |
| repeated sequence homogenization between the control and pseudo-control regions in the mitochondrial genomes of the subfamily aquilinae. | in birds, the noncoding control region (cr) and its flanking genes are the only parts of the mitochondrial (mt) genome that have been modified by intragenomic rearrangements. in raptors, two noncoding regions are present: the cr has shifted to a new position with respect to the "ancestral avian gene order," whereas the pseudo-control region (psicr) is located at the original genomic position of the cr. as possible mechanisms for this rearrangement, duplication and transposition have been conside ... | 2009 | 19205013 |
| limitations of methods to test density-dependent fecundity hypothesis. | 1. two main hypotheses are usually invoked to explain density dependence in fecundity: the habitat heterogeneity hypothesis (hhh) and the individual adjustment hypothesis (iah). although simple methods have been proposed to discriminate between the two hypotheses, their adequacy was tested for only a limited set of real and model populations. 2. in a computer simulation study based on a stochastic territory-based approach, ferrer, newton & casado (2006, journal of animal ecology, 75, 111-117) ar ... | 2008 | 18254920 |
| density dependence hypotheses and the distribution of fecundity. | 1. beja & palma (2008, journal of animal ecology, 77, doi: 10.1111/j.1365-2656.2007.01312.x) attempt to provide a critical analysis of the effectiveness and limitations of a previously published method (ferrer et al. 2006, journal of animal ecology, 75, 111-117.) to discriminate between habitat heterogeneity hypothesis and the individual adjustment hypothesis using real data from a bonelli's eagle hieraaetus fasciatus population. 2. they conclude that significant and strong correlations between ... | 2008 | 18081779 |
| detection of strychnine by gas chromatography-mass spectrometry in the carcase of a bonelli's eagle (hieraaetus fasciatus). | | 2006 | 16891428 |
| trichomonas infection in a community of free-ranging domestic and wild columbiformes and bonelli's eagle (aquila fasciata). | trichomonas gallinae is a pathogen of conservation relevance, whose main maintenance hosts are columbiformes, but spillover to avian predators has been described. the goal of this study was to characterize the epidemiology of trichomonas spp. in a community of free-ranging domestic and wild columbiformes and an endangered predator, bonelli's eagle aquila fasciata. we surveyed 253 live-captured rock doves, 16 nestling bonelli's eagles and 41 hunted columbiformes. oro-esophageal swabs were incubat ... | 2019 | 31192234 |
| from sport hunting to breeding success: patterns of lead ammunition ingestion and its effects on an endangered raptor. | lead is highly toxic for wildlife, with pernicious consequences especially in long-lived predators. the causes of lead ammunition ingestion in bonelli's eagle (aquila fasciata) and its effects on breeding success were studied in one of the most important populations of this endangered species in europe. regurgitated pellets belonging to different pairs from 2004 to 2014 were analyzed, both in the breeding (1363 pellets from 12 territories) and non-breeding (172 pellets from 9 territories) season ... | 2018 | 28918280 |
| wild bonelli's eagles (aquila fasciata) as carrier of antimicrobial resistant salmonella and campylobacter in eastern spain. | wild birds have repeatedly been found to be involved in the dissemination of enteric bacterial pathogens in the environment. the aim of this study was to determine the occurrence of salmonella and campylobacter as well as the antimicrobial resistance in wild bonelli's eagles nestlings in eastern spain. in addition, we compared the efficiency of two sampling methods (fresh faecal samples from nest and cloacal swabs from nestlings) for detection of both bacteria. a total of 28 nests with 45 nestli ... | 2019 | 31629291 |
| radiographic reference values for the cardiac silhouette in bonelli's eagle (aquila fasciata). | radiographs are an important diagnostic tool available in wildlife hospitals to evaluate the size of the avian heart. despite the large variety wild birds in the iberian peninsula, clinical studies addressing these species are lacking. to establish reference values for cardiac size in the bonelli's eagle (aquila fasciata), ventrodorsal radiographs of 20 healthy birds were obtained, and the width of the cardiac silhouette, sternum, thorax, coracoid, and hepatic silhouette were measured. the ratio ... | 2019 | 31124612 |
| copulatory behaviour in the bonelli´s eagle: assessing the paternity assurance hypothesis. | we examined copulatory behaviour in the bonelli´s eagle (aquila fasciata) at nesting sites in the eastern zone of the baetic cordillera, southern spain, between 2010 and 2012. we observed the copulatory behaviour of 15 pairs during the pre-laying period. bonelli´s eagles commenced sexual activity ca. 69 days before egg-laying. ninety-six percent of mounting attempts were successful. bonelli´s eagle pairs averaged 99.8 copulation attempts per clutch, with an average copulation frequency of 0.86 c ... | 2019 | 31112564 |
| using an apex predator for large-scale monitoring of trace element contamination: associations with environmental, anthropogenic and dietary proxies. | understanding the levels and drivers of contamination in top predators is important for their conservation and eventual use as sentinels in environmental monitoring. therefore, metals and trace elements were analyzed in feathers of bonelli's eagles (aquila fasciata) from southern portugal in 2007-2013, where they are believed to be exposed to a wide range of contamination sources such as agricultural land uses, urban areas, active and abandoned mines and a coal-fired power plant. we focused on c ... | 2019 | 31054418 |
| effects of rearing conditions on natal dispersal processes in a long-lived predator bird. | natal or prebreeding dispersal is a key driver of the functioning, dynamics, and evolution of populations. conditions experienced by individuals during development, that is, rearing conditions, may have serious consequences for the multiple components that shape natal dispersal processes. rearing conditions vary as a result of differences in parental and environmental quality, and it has been shown that favorable rearing conditions are beneficial for individuals throughout their lives. however, ... | 2018 | 30038767 |
| occurrence of helminth parasites in the gastrointestinal tract of wild birds from wildlife rehabilitation and investigation centre of ria formosa in southern portugal. | this study was carried out in southern portugal to determine the prevalence of parasitic helminths infecting wild birds. between september and december of 2013, adult parasites were collected from the gastrointestinal tract of 22 bird specimens (belonging to 12 species) that died in wildlife rehabilitation and investigation centre of the ria formosa. identified gastrointestinal parasites include the nematodes (contracaecum sp., cosmocephalus obvelatus, desportesius invaginatus, dispharynx nasuta ... | 2017 | 31014630 |