A case of male nest sitting in the Greater White-fronted Goose Anser albifrons
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Abstract
Nest sitting by males is rare in the Anserinae subfamily and has never previously been reported for the Greater White-fronted Goose Anser albifrons. Here one case of a male repeatedly sitting on a nest is described, based on recordings from automatic camera traps used to study the behaviour of breeding pairs. The male attended the nest during the female’s absence, and there was a positive correlation between the time that the female spent away from the nest and the duration of nest sitting by the male. The female’s absent periods and the time spent nest sitting by the male both increased as incubation progressed but then decreased during the last five days before hatching. The female tended to leave the nest more frequently during the day, whereas the male’s nest sitting was not affected by the time of day. Further studies with larger sample sizes are needed to ascertain how common nest sitting behaviour is in male Greater White-fronted Geese.
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