Seasonal variation in energy expenditure is not related to activity level or water temperature in a large diving bird.

Abstract

There is considerable interest in understanding how the energy budget of an endotherm is modulated from a physiological and ecological point of view. In this paper, we used daily (24 h) heart rate (f(H24)), as a proxy of daily energy expenditure (DEE) across seasons, to test the effect of locomotion activity and water temperature on the energy budget of a large diving bird. f(H24) was monitored continuously in common eiders (Somateria mollissima) during 7 months together with measures of time spent flying and time spent feeding. f(H24) varied substantially during the recording period, with numerous increases and decreases that occurred across seasons, although we did not find any relationship between f(H24) and the time spent active (feeding and flying). However, inactive heart rate (f(H,inactive)) decreased as locomotion activity increased, suggesting that common eiders were using some form of compensation when under a high work load. We were also unable to detect a negative relationship between water temperature and resting heart rate, a proxy of resting metabolic rate. This was unexpected, based on the assumption that high thermoregulation costs would be associated with cold waters. We showed instead that a high level of energy expenditure coincided with feather moult and warm waters, which suggests that the observed variable pattern of seasonal DEE was driven by these two factors. Nevertheless, our results indicate that compensation and possibly the timing of moult may be used as mechanisms to reduce seasonal variation in energy expenditure.