Spatio-temporal patterns of juvenile common ravens integrating into a free-flying non-breeder flock.

For animals living in structured groups, social integration matters: numerous studies reveal fitness advantages for well-integrated over poorly integrated individuals. Surprisingly, little is known about individuals' spatio-temporal behaviors preceding naturally occurring social integration events. We here applied a biologging-based approach to study juvenile ravens during dispersal, when they approach and join non-breeder groups. We computed three GPS-based movement metrics as proxies for their attraction to locations used by the local non-breeder flock and their attraction to other conspecifics. We found differences in the spatial usage patterns of juveniles compared to older birds, and an influence of the rearing background (wild or captive parents). We also found that familiarity among individuals, i.e., whether they were from the same release groups or not, predicted shared space use. Our results indicate that spatial patterns derived from movement analyses are a promising step toward understanding how individuals spatially orient themselves preceding social integration.