| Popis: |
It is not uncommon for different species within a guild to be non-randomly segregated within a landscape through the occupation of different preferred macrohabitats. The explanation most amenable with ecological theory is that different guild members are adapted for exploiting the different opportunities offered by such macrohabitats. Morphological characters are possible adaptations reflecting habitat preferences. We investigated morphological traits in a guild of small foliage-gleaning, insectivorous birds breeding in central Ontario, Canada (4 families; 23 species). We measured 27 skeletal features and compared 2 types of differences: those between conspecific sexes (that by necessity occupy the same macrohabitat) and those between different guild members (that tend to occupy different macrohabitats). We predicted that if macrohabitat differences are reflected in different morphologies, the differences between conspecific sexes would be less than the differences between species, at least after... |
