Making the most of the old age: Autumn breeding as an extra reproductive investment in older seabirds.

The extrinsic and intrinsic factors affecting differing reproductive strategies among populations are central to understanding population and evolutionary ecology. To evaluate whether individual reproductive strategies responded to annual patterns in marine productivity and age-related processes in a seabird we used a long term (2003-2013), a continuous dataset on nest occupancy and attendance at the colony by little penguins () at Phillip Island (Victoria, Australia). We found that concurrent with a secondary annual peak of marine productivity, a secondary peak in colony attendance and nest occupancy was observed in Autumn (out of the regular breeding season in spring/summer) with individuals showing mating-like behavior.