Survival, Recovery, and Reproductive Success of Mottled Ducks on the Upper Texas Coast

Anas fulvigula (Mottled Duck) has experienced long-term population declines due to habitat loss and other anthropogenic factors. Our objectives were to (1) generate annual survival and recovery estimates, while examining the influence of age and sex, and (2) examine the influence of rainfall and drought on reproductive success. We followed the Brownie approach using the RMark package in R to analyze 4967 bandings and 705 recoveries from 2004–2015. We examined linear and curvilinear relationships between precipitation variables and a reproductive index. Hatch-year (HY) males had the highest annual recovery probability, while after-hatch-year (AHY) females had the lowest. Annual survival varied predominately by sex but also with age. Hatch-year females had the lowest estimate of survival, while after-hatch-year males had the highest. Total rainfall during peak nesting season showed a weak negative relationship with our reproductive success index (β = -0.0085, 95% CI: -0.0240, 0.0070), and was our only competitive model besides the null. Annual survival and recovery estimates were similar to other studies on Mottled Ducks. Our reproductive success analysis was inconclusive in that either there is no effect of precipitation or the measures we used for the reproduction index or the predictor variables were inadequate.