TIE

ive al 2To select their future breeding site, individuals usually have to assess local quality by using environmental cues. One optimal cue may be ‘public information’, the local reproductive success of conspecifics in a breeding patch (patch reproductive success) because it integrates the effect of all environmental factors on breeding success. However, the quality of information conveyed by patch reproductive success is likely to depend on (1) environmental predictability and (2) interactions between individuals. We investigated how these two factors, ignored by previous models, affect the performance of individuals using patch reproductive success for breeding habitat selection compared with other information. We built a two-patch, game-theoretical model to compare the success of a strategy of breeding habitat selection based on patch reproductive success relative to four other strategies: (1) random patch choice; (2) philopatry; (3) choice based on the presence of conspecifics the previous year (conspecific attraction); and (4) choice based on intrinsic patch quality the previous year. The results illustrate how the efficiency of strategies in tracking variations in patch quality depend on environmental predictability and costs linked to density dependence, themselves linked to the dynamics of spatial aggregation of individuals. I