The feeding area selection of the common crane was studied between 1996–1998 in the Hortobágy National Park and surrounding areas during the autumn migration and staging over period. The cranes roosted in marshlands and drained fishponds and fed in the following types of agricultural areas: maize stubble, maize-, wheat-, alfalfa-, and abandoned fields as well as natural grasslands. The largest proportion of crane flocks fed on maize stubbles on waste grain. Family flocks usually fed separately. The type of feeding area did not depend on the time of the day. The density of feeding flocks did not depend on the type of feeding area, indicating high abundance of food. The study suggests that agricultural areas inside the National Park should be used for growing maize for staging cranes in order to attract them from disturbed non-protected arable lands outside the National Park. It is also important to stop wildfowl-hunting in fishponds to let cranes choose between more roost sites closer to feeding areas.
Recently a large number of studies have reported an increase in the variability in the climate, which affects behavioural and physiological adaptations in a broad range of organisms. Specifically, insects may be especially sensitive to climatic fluctuations, as their physiology and life history traits, like those of other ectotherms, are predominantly affected by environmental factors. Here we aimed to investigate climate-induced changes in several morphometric measures of the Heath Fritillary in North-Eastern Hungary, which is a highly diverse transitional area. During this study we tested the following hypotheses: (i) climate affects genitalia and body size to various degrees (ii) increasing variability in climate induces higher levels of fluctuating asymmetry and variance in all morphological characters. To our knowledge, this study is the first to analyse simultaneously wing size and structure of genitalia of a butterfly in response to variability in climate. Our findings suggest that wing and genital traits may exhibit similar degrees of stability in response to a more variable climate, although the response in terms of forewing size differs from that of other body measurements and the structure of the genitalia. These findings suggest that global climate change may affect lepidopteran body metrics over longer periods of time. Our findings parallel the results of investigations showing that insect morphology might be modified by environmental changes, which is especially the case for those body parts that are phenotypically very variable. However, we found no evidence that increasing variability in climate would induce higher levels of fluctuating asymmetry and greater variability in morphological characters., Edit Juhász, Zsolt Végvári, János P. Tóth, Katalin Pecsenye, Zoltán Varga., and Obsahuje bibliografii