Hastings Natural History Reservation

31 Mar, 05 PM - 14 Jul, 05 PM

We will continue several ongoing research projects in spring 2010, all of which require intensive monitoring of western bluebird nest boxes and breeding pairs. These projects include: 1. Winter social behavior in western bluebirds. This project focuses on the evolution of winter family structure in western bluebirds, which form kin groups through delayed dispersal of sons, which remain with their parents and settle to breed nearby with neighboring females or with females that have immigrated into their winter group. Delayed dispersal, where offspring remain home for longer than is required to achieve nutritional (or financial) independence, is thought to be the starting point for the evolution of complex kin groups. Once families remain close together, there are many possibilities for family-centered social behavior. Observational studies have implicated wealth of resources and nepotism as two key routes to family stability. Where resources are plentiful, it is advantageous for parents to preferentially share resources with their offspring promoting offspring survival and, ultimately, family inheritance and the formation of dynasties localized in space. While these principles are thought to guide the evolution of social behavior in everything from ants to humans, there are relatively few systems in which resources and parental nepotism can be manipulated. The western bluebird's heavy reliance on mistletoe, a clumped and highly visible winter food resource, and the ease with which they can be captured and held in captivity, make them tractable for experimental manipulation of both resources and parental nepotism. Prior work has manipulated mistletoe abundance on winter territories showing a reduction in delayed dispersal of sons, even though their parents remained on territory for winter. Future experiments will investigate the importance of parents, both together and separately, to determine whether sons leave when deprived of parents on intact territories. We will also continue long-term monitoring to assess the impact of both resources and parents on the proliferation of genetic dynasties within a nest box population. 2. Neophobia in western bluebirds. The ?Personality Profiles? experiment is an assessment of boldness or shyness of individual birds and addresses the following question: Do birds take longer to deliver food to nestlings when a novel object is placed on their nest box than when confronted with a leaf (a non-novel object) in the same spot? Note on the experimental protocol: The leaf is a ?control? that will allow us to determine whether the birds are responding differently to a novel object (checkered bow) than to a familiar object (leaf) on their box. We will collect a leaf nearby that is as similar in size as possible to the checkered bow. In half the trials we will present the leaf first and the other half we will present the checkered bow first. The behavior measured is latency to first feeding attempt.

Visit #19906 @Hastings Natural History Reservation

Approved

Under Project # 414 | Research

Ecology and Behavior of Western Bluebirds

faculty - Cornell University

Reservation Members(s)

Janis Dickinson Mar 31 - Jul 14, 2010 (106 days)

Reserve Resources(s) | Create Invoice

Robertson House 1 Mar 31 - Jul 14, 2010