I am interested in using hormonal response measurements to make predictions of bird breeding success. I have seen work linking CORT, IgY, and a few other hormones, but have not found much direct evidence that any of these measurements are a good (the best) proxy for fitness. Is one measurement better than others, should we use a combination? Any suggestions are most appreciated!
This has been studied a bit in marine birds that forage at sea. Take a look at this article
http://www.sfu.ca/biology2/wildberg/papers/VanderkistetalFunctEcol00.pdf
Hey thanks Jason!
VTG is great when you are sampling during the breeding season, but other hormones like CORT, testosterone, and IgG can be useful indicators of fitness beyond the breeding season and can be measured (with some exceptions) in both sexes. CORT can be measured in feathers, and that is my preferred method, but I am open to other ideas too. While i haven't followed a lot of the VTG research over the last decade, I don't recall levels of that protein to correspond with parental behavior or chick survival, and I would ultimately like to find something that will help me to link population dynamics with hormone levels of individuals. Thanks for the article, it always nice to get stuck on a fun tangent :)
It's presumably difficult to use hormonal state as a proxy for fitness, but the hormonal maternal effects literature might give you some insights. Eg higher levels of circulating T in the mothers being associated with higher levels of T deposition in eggs and hence enhanced competitive ability of the offspring.
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