CARRY-over effects of early life conditions on MOVEment and their consequences for performance – CARRY-MOVE

Early-life conditions have pervasive and far-reaching consequences for the life history of most animals. In long-lived species, many phenotypic traits that are expressed in adulthood depends on the environmental conditions encountered during early life, from early pregnancy to weaning. The developmental history of an organism thus influences the outcome of the interaction with its current environment at each life stage, with extensive implications for population dynamics and the evolution of life histories. Carry-over effects are events, processes or experiences that occur during a given stage of an individual development and that alter the state or condition of the individual in a later stage. Although movement is a key behaviour linking environmental conditions to an individual’s fitness, how early life conditions and its interplay with subsequent events influence movement, and how it relates to phenotype and performance during adulthood remains largely unexplored. CARRY-MOVE will fill this gap by evaluating the roles of early life conditions on the ontogeny of movement, and their carry-over impacts on movement during adulthood and ultimately, on performance. Our central objective is to explore the direct and delayed pathways by which global changes impact the lifetime track of individuals and, in turn, the population dynamics of large herbivores with contrasting life histories. In WP1, using 2 exceptional long term study sites with marked juveniles, we will link early conditions and experience to early and later movements and individual performance. In WP2, we will evaluate the effects of between- and within-cohort variation in early life conditions on adult behaviour and movement using a larger range of species. Finally, using worldwide datasets, we will assess in WP3 whether the response of adult movement tactics to early life conditions varies according to a range of structuring factors known to shape life history variation.