I'm sure there's some evidence in this article
http://www.sciencedirect.com/sci ... i/S0301479708800023 - but I'm not up for spending US$ 40 for the pleasure!
The 2nd paragraph of the abstract 'Human-induced disturbance can have a significant negative effect on breeding success by causing nest abandonment and increased predation' and some common sense ,is enough for most of us to realise that most of the time we should try to minimise the stress to nesting birds & their young when possible.I 'm sure many of us will have first hand experience of the stress involved in rearing children or will be able to acknowledge the stress we caused our own parents at times!
Interestingly there are other articles relating long term stress and future breeding.
http://esciencenews.com/articles ... eding.success.birds
I think the bottom line in the latter article,is that stressed birds produce less offspring because they are more focussed on survival rather than reproduction.
Eric
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Last edited by EricB at 4/06/2011 02:08 ]
