Data for: Evidence for a maintenance cost for birds maintaining highly flexible basal, but not summit, metabolic rates

Reversible phenotypic flexibility allows organisms to better match phenotypes to prevailing environmental conditions and may produce fitness benefits. Costs and constraints of phenotypic flexibility may limit the capacity for flexible responses but are not well understood or documented. Costs could include expenses associated with maintaining the flexible system or with generating the flexible response. One potential cost of maintaining a flexible system is an energetic cost reflected in the basal metabolic rate (BMR), with elevated BMR in individuals with more flexible metabolic responses. We accessed data from thermal acclimation studies of birds where BMR and/or Msum (maximum cold-induced metabolic rate) were measured before and after acclimation, as a measure of metabolic flexibility, to test the hypothesis that flexibility in BMR (ΔBMR), Msum (ΔMsum), or metabolic scope (Msum – BMR; ΔScope) is positively correlated with BMR. When temperature treatments lasted at least three weeks, three of six species showed significant positive correlations between ΔBMR and BMR, one species showed a significant negative correlation, and two species showed no significant correlation. ΔMsum and BMR were not significantly correlated for any species and ΔScope and BMR were significantly positively correlated for only one species. These data suggest that support costs exist for maintaining high BMR flexibility for some bird species, but high flexibility in Msum or metabolic scope does not generally incur elevated maintenance costs.Funding provided by: National Science FoundationCrossref Funder Registry ID: http://dx.doi.org/10.13039/100000001Award Number: IOS-1021218Funding provided by: National Science FoundationCrossref Funder Registry ID: http://dx.doi.org/10.13039/100000001Award Number: OIA 1632810Funding provided by: National Natural Science Foundation of ChinaCrossref Funder Registry ID: http://dx.doi.org/10.13039/501100001809Award Number: 31971420Funding provided by: National Natural Science Foundation of ChinaCrossref Funder Registry ID: http://dx.doi.org/10.13039/501100001809Award Number: 31470472Funding provided by: National Research FoundationCrossref Funder Registry ID: http://dx.doi.org/10.13039/501100001321Award Number: 119754Funding provided by: Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of CanadaCrossref Funder Registry ID: http://dx.doi.org/10.13039/501100000038Award Number: RGPIN-2015-05244Funding provided by: Canada Foundation for InnovationCrossref Funder Registry ID: http://dx.doi.org/10.13039/501100000196Award Number: 27380Literature search – data collected from co-authors