查看文章

Throughout the world, urban sprawl converts agricultural land to urban environments, however, little is known of the influence of such landscape change on the reproductive success of native species. We predicted that reproductive success would be suppressed by urban sprawl through habitat degradation and indirectly through compromised quality of parental care from human disturbance. We studied the masked lapwing, Vanellus miles, a common ground-nesting species that occurs in both agricultural and suburban landscapes. Contrary to our predictions, parents in suburban environments invested more in defence of eggs (aggression and distraction) yet suburban female lapwings were in better condition (7% heavier) and laid 2% longer eggs than agricultural female lapwings, suggesting greater access to food resources in suburban than agricultural environments. Lapwings had higher hatching success in …