The relationship between temperature, rainfall, and tree swallow fledging times

Weather effects such as temperature and precipitation are known to affect reproductive success of many avian species. Weather variables can directly or indirectly influence the fledging success of nestlings. I investigated the effect of minimum temperature, maximum temperature, average temperature, maximum rainfall experienced in one day during a fledging period, and average daily rainfall on how long it takes tree swallow nestlings in Tennessee to fledge using multi-linear regression and linear mixed-effects modeling. I found that minimum temperatures, maximum temperatures, maximum rain experienced in a one-day period, and total rain all had a significant relationship on the time it takes for tree swallow chicks to fledge (p<0.05). The best model includes these weather variables and can account for about 20-21% of the variation seen in the time it takes tree swallow chicks to fledge.

Grantor dc:publisher

University of Tennessee at Chattanooga

Author dc:creator

• Gruber, Caleb

Contributors dc:contributor

• Aborn, David
• McRae, Thaddeus; Hayes, Loren D.
• College of Arts and Sciences

• Tree swallow--Effect of temperature on--Tennessee
• Tree swallow--Infancy--Tennessee

Licence

• http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/

Language dc:language

English, eng

Repository record dc:identifier

https://scholar.utc.edu/theses/802

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:scholar.utc.edu:theses-1992