magellanic_penguins: Magellanic Penguin Foraging and Reproductive Data

In ecoteach: Educational Datasets for Ecology and Agriculture

Magellanic Penguin Foraging and Reproductive Data

Description

Data from satellite tracking of Magellanic penguins (Spheniscus magellanicus) at Punta Tombo, Argentina, spanning 23 breeding seasons. The dataset contains information on foraging site fidelity, trip characteristics, and reproductive success for individual penguins.

Usage

magellanic_penguins

Format

A data frame with 212 rows and 21 variables:

SeasonYear

Integer, breeding season year

PenguinID

Integer, unique identifier for each penguin

PenguinSeq

Integer, sequential penguin number within season

InstrumentSeq

Integer, instrument deployment sequence

NTripPairsLong

Integer, number of long trip pairs

DistBetMean

Numeric, mean distance between foraging sites (km)

DistBetSD

Numeric, standard deviation of distance between sites (km)

DistBetMin

Numeric, minimum distance between foraging sites (km)

DistBetMax

Numeric, maximum distance between foraging sites (km)

InstrType

Factor, type of tracking instrument used

InstrModel

Character, model of tracking instrument

NFledged

Integer, number of chicks that fledged successfully

DurDaysMean

Numeric, mean trip duration in days

TripDistMean

Numeric, mean trip distance (km)

BearingMean

Numeric, mean bearing of foraging trips (degrees)

PenguinSex

Factor, sex of penguin ("Male", "Female")

NumTrips

Integer, total number of foraging trips

NumChicksDeploy

Integer, number of chicks at deployment

NumChicksStarved

Integer, number of chicks that starved

DeployDurDays

Integer, deployment duration in days

ChlaMean

Numeric, mean chlorophyll-a concentration

Source

Rebstock, G., Abrahms, B., & Boersma, D. (2022). Data from: Site fidelity increases reproductive success by increasing foraging efficiency in a marine predator. Dryad Digital Repository. \Sexpr[results=rd]{tools:::Rd_expr_doi("10.5061/DRYAD.8931ZCRSV")}

References

Rebstock, G.A., Abrahms, B. & Boersma, P.D. (2022). Site fidelity increases reproductive success by increasing foraging efficiency in a marine predator. Proceedings of the Royal Society B, 289(1975), 20220175.

Examples

# Load the dataset
data(magellanic_penguins)

# Basic exploration
head(magellanic_penguins)
summary(magellanic_penguins)

# Examine foraging efficiency by sex
boxplot(TripDistMean ~ PenguinSex, data = magellanic_penguins,
        main = "Mean Trip Distance by Sex",
        xlab = "Sex", ylab = "Mean Trip Distance (km)")

# Relationship between site fidelity and reproductive success
plot(magellanic_penguins$DistBetMean, magellanic_penguins$NFledged,
     xlab = "Mean Distance Between Sites (km)",
     ylab = "Number of Chicks Fledged",
     main = "Site Fidelity vs Reproductive Success")

ecoteach documentation built on June 29, 2025, 5:08 p.m.