Some species of birds reproduce not by rearing their own young, but by handing that task on to adults of other species. Known as brood parasitism, this habit has been most thoroughly researched in the cuckoo. Previous research ...
Ecology
Apr 8, 2013
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Brown-headed cowbirds show a bias in the sex ratio of their offspring depending on the time of the breeding season, researchers report in a new study. More female than male offspring hatch early in the breeding season in ...
Plants & Animals
Jun 24, 2020
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]New behavioral traits are often the first response of animals to changing environmental conditions. As cities increasingly become habitats of wildlife, researchers have studied behavioral changes in birds and examined how ...
Plants & Animals
Aug 22, 2023
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Daurian redstarts move their nesting sites closer to or even inside human settlements when cuckoos are around. In doing so, they actively protect their nest against brood parasitism, as cuckoos avoid human settlements.
Plants & Animals
Feb 22, 2023
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97
Just as humans are usually left- or right-handed, other species sometimes prefer one appendage, or eye, over the other. A new study reveals that American robins that preferentially use one eye significantly more than the ...
Ecology
Jul 24, 2019
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Reed warblers use mobbing as a front line of nest defense against parasitic cuckoos, according to a new report published online on January 29th in Current Biology, a Cell Press publication. Cuckoos act as parasites by laying ...
Jan 29, 2009
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Researchers at the University of Illinois have shown through a multi-year study that cowbirds (Molothrus ater) conform to Bateman's Principle, which holds that reproductive success is greater in males than in females when ...
Plants & Animals
Sep 30, 2019
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North Americans might be seeing new species of birds in certain areas of the continent in the near future. According to research conducted by a psychology professor at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, and his co-authors, ...
Plants & Animals
Sep 16, 2015
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Temnothorax americanus is a slavemaking ant found in northeastern America. These tiny social insects neither rear their offspring nor search for food themselves. Instead, they raid nests of another ant species, Temnothorax ...
Plants & Animals
Feb 28, 2019
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40
Avian brood parasites lay their eggs in the nests of other bird species, forcing the hosts to do the hard work of raising the unrelated young. A team of scientists wanted to simulate the task of piercing an egg—a tactic ...
Ecology
Apr 8, 2021
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