ArticleEcology and evolution2022
Favorable winds speed up bird migration in spring but not in autumn.
Article in Ecology and evolution, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 6 papers.
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Who cites it
6 citing papers in PubMed.
- Structuring the skies: Diel dynamics of migratory animal movement in the lower atmosphere.Ecology · 2025Article
- Enhanced forecasting of bird nocturnal migration intensity in relation to previous days and synoptic weather patterns.International journal of biometeorology · 2025Article
- Contrasting seasonal responses to wind in migrating songbirds on a globally important flyway.Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2024Article
- Determinants of spring migration departure dates in a New World sparrow: Weather variables reign supreme.Ecology and evolution · 2024Article
- The urge to breed early: Similar responses to environmental conditions in short- and long-distance migrants during spring migration.Ecology and evolution · 2023Article
- Favorable winds speed up bird migration in spring but not in autumn.Ecology and evolution · 2022Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
4 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Wind has a significant yet complex effect on bird migration speed. With prevailing south wind, overall migration is generally faster in spring than in autumn. However, studies on the difference in airspeed between seasons have shown contrasting results so far, in part due to their limited geographical or temporal coverage. Using the first full-year weather radar data set of nocturnal bird migration across western Europe together with wind speed from reanalysis data, we investigate variation of airspeed across season. We additionally expand our analysis of ground speed, airspeed, wind speed, and wind profit variation across time (seasonal and daily) and space (geographical and altitudinal). Our result confirms that wind plays a major role in explaining both temporal and spatial variabilities in ground speed. The resulting airspeed remains relatively constant at all scales (daily, seasonal, geographically and altitudinally). We found that spring airspeed is overall 5% faster in Spring than autumn, but we argue that this number is not significant compared to the biases and limitation of weather radar data. The results of the analysis can be used to further investigate birds' migratory strategies across space and time, as well as their energy use.
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