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Do you ever find the food provided by the dining hall so undesirable, that you have to dig up those months-old snacks in your fridge or cabinet? Some animals in nature behave in the same way. When facing the threat … Continue reading
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Many birds have evolved as migratory species. This means they spend the majority of their lifespan in flight, traveling long distances when they are not in their breeding period. One such group are Old World swifts which spend up to … Continue reading
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Fabio Marcolin and his colleagues study how different evolutionary pressures affect bird song. This study is focused on parrots, and tested four theories about how birds evolve their specific song. Why do birds sing the way they do? To answer … Continue reading
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Animals utilize their different sensory systems – smell, vision, and hearing, among others – to gather information about their environment. Further, the sensory modalities an animal uses to most effectively gather information vary between species. For instance, while humans seem … Continue reading
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All across the animal kingdom, animals communicate with each other by sending signals. Many use multimodal signaling, which includes components in multiple sensory modalities, for example, both visual and auditory. It is thought that ordering multiple signals increases evolutionary fitness … Continue reading
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When spring rolls around, birds migrate northward in order to follow the call of the wild, the swell in insect population and plants for food and to find bountiful breeding and nesting sites in the lush riparian landscapes that burst … Continue reading
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Sensory ecology is a growing field of scientific exploration that meaningfully engages sensory information–such as visual, olfactory, and auditory signals–with an individual’s natural environment. Research in this field provides us with key insights into the decision-making process of animals, which … Continue reading
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With the climate crisis ravaging our planet, it is crucial to understand how animal behavior adapts to changing environmental conditions. Although not always the result of climate change, new ecological or geographical barriers can cause the divergence of species. Divergence … Continue reading
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Specialized sensory systems, perfected over years of evolution, enable animals to exploit various information in the environment. By extracting salient information from their surroundings, animals can adjust their behavior in ways that promote their survival and reproduction. Behaviors such as … Continue reading
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Animals’ mating displays are often multimodal which means that they incorporate different signaling types that include acoustic, visual, chemical, and seismic signals. Depending on environmental conditions, the males of certain species can adapt their multimodal signaling by alternating between signals. … Continue reading
