behavior
grrlscientist | July 30, 2008tags: researchblogging.org, animal migration, ecology, conservation, habitat destruction, global warming, overexploitation
Image: Makoa Farm Horseback Riding Safaris in Tanzania [larger view].
What do salmon, passenger pigeons, American bison and wildebeest have in common? They all are (or were) migratory, and their populations either are declining or have become extinct. In fact, the populations of nearly all migratory animals, from insects to fishes, birds to mammals, are suffering disproportionate population declines that sedentary species are not experiencing. This is hardly…
grrlscientist | July 30, 2008tags: flamingos, baboons, nature, streaming video
This streaming National Geographic video shows a group of hungry baboons in Kenya's Lake Bogoria that find themselves surrounded by a million unsuspecting, and unprotected, flamingos. I am sure you can guess what happens next. [2:40]
grrlscientist | July 28, 2008tags: twin baby moose, sprinkler, Anchorage Alaska, streaming video
Here's a sweet little video showing twin baby moose playing in a sprinkler in the back yard of a resident of Anchorage, Alaska. Mom also gets in on the fun. June 2008. [3:52]
grrlscientist | July 22, 2008tags: researchblogging.org, dichromatism, mating system, plumage color, sex allocation, eclectus parrots, Eclectus roratus, ornithology, birds, avian, parrots
Elektra, my female Solomon Islands eclectus parrot, Eclectus roratus solomonensis.
This is the smallest and most distinctively marked of all the subspecies of eclectus parrots.
Image: GrrlScientist 4 July 2008 [larger view].
Some of you might recall the recent story about scientists learning to identify plumage coloration from fossilized feathers. This might seem a sort of esoteric pursuit meant to entertain scientists with access to…
grrlscientist | July 11, 2008tags: researchblogging.org, birdsong, personality traits, mate choice, sexual selection, risk taking, European collared flycatcher, Ficedula albicollis, László Zsolt Garamszegi
Male European collared flycatcher, Ficedula albicollis, singing.
Image: Beijershamn Ãland, 23 May 2004 [link].
Canon EOS 300D Digital Rebel 1/1000s f/8.0 at 400.0mm iso400.
Most people don't believe that animals possess distinct personalities, although they readily recognize and can describe individual personalities among their family, friends and neighbors and are aware of the importance of individual personalities…
grrlscientist | July 11, 2008tags: researchblogging.org, reciprocal altruism, cooperation, anti-predator behavior, mobbing, birds, pied flycatcher, Ficedula hypoleuca, Indrikis Krams
Male European pied flycatcher, Ficedula hypoleuca, singing.
Skåne, Sweden.
Image: Omar Brännström, 8 May 2005 [link].
Canon EOS 1D Mark II ,Canon EF 500mm f/4L IS USM 1/640s f/5.6 at 700.0mm iso320.
Meticulous experimental design is crucial to understanding the evolution of specific behaviors, expecially complex and subtle behaviors exhibited by highly intelligent and very social animals, such as birds. One such behavior is mobbing…
grrlscientist | July 8, 2008tags: researchblogging.org, female scientists, science publishing, double-blind review, single-blind review, cultural observation, gender bias, sexism, feminism
A microbiologist at work.
Image: East Bay AWIS.
A few months ago, a controversy occurred in the blogosphere regarding whether scientific papers whose first author is female are discriminated against during the peer-review process, and the suggestion was to institute double-blind peer review as a way to mitigate this possibility. "Double-blinding" as this is sometimes referred to, is a process where a manuscript that has been…
grrlscientist | June 24, 2008tags: researchblogging.org, Black-throated Blue Warbler, Dendroica caerulescens, social information, habitat selection, vegetation structure, location cues, dispersal, Matthew G Betts
Male Black-throated Blue Warbler, Dendroica caerulescens, with nestlings.
Image: S. Maslowski, USFWS [larger view].
Wild songbirds must be able to quickly discriminate between different habitats so they can choose and establish a suitable breeding territory. Since even older, experienced breeding songbirds lose roughly 50% of their chicks to predators, even a small mistake in choosing a breeding territory…
grrlscientist | June 23, 2008tags: researchblogging.org, scientific ethics, Hippocratic oath, life scientists, corporate culture
I promise never to allow financial gain, competitiveness or ambition cloud my judgment in the conduct of ethical research and scholarship. I will pursue knowledge and create knowledge for the greater good, but never to the detriment of colleagues, supervisors, research subjects or the international community of scholars of which I am now a member.
Scientific misconduct is very expensive, leading to years of wasted research dollars and effort in pursuit of a scientific mirage, and it damages the…
grrlscientist | June 23, 2008tags: seven forbidden words, George Carlin, humor, comedy, streaming video
When I woke up this morning I heard George Carlin talk about the seven forbidden words -- another examination of language that eventually led to the involvement of the Supreme Court. This video is not safe for your easily offended boss (but don't worry about the kids -- they already talk like this) [10:38]
grrlscientist | June 23, 2008tags: language as bullshit, George Carlin, humor, comedy, streaming video
When I woke up this morning, I heard George Carlin talk about language on NPR. What's wrong with using simple, direct and honest language? He wonders. "It's getting so bad that any day now I expect to hear a rape victim described as an 'unwilling sperm recipient'!" [6:55]
grrlscientist | June 23, 2008tags: shit versus stuff, George Carlin, humor, comedy, streaming video
I woke up this morning to hear George Carlin talking about materialism on the radio. You know, stuff. Yes, stuff. "Have you noticed that their stuff is 'shit' and your shit is 'stuff'?" he asks [5:09]
grrlscientist | June 23, 2008tags: pro-life is anti-woman, George Carlin, humor, comedy, streaming video
George Carlin talks about the so-called pro-life people, who use their hypocritical position to legalize and institutionalize their hatred for women. He asks, Why, when it's us, it's an abortion, but when it's a chicken, it's an omelet? [9:50]
grrlscientist | June 17, 2008tags: evolution, beak and body size, Geospiza fortis, inbreeding, mating patterns, reproductive isolation, sexual imprinting
A family tree depicts the evolution of the 14 species of "Darwin's finches".
(The focus of this study, the Medium Ground Finch, Geospiza fortis, is denoted with a red dot).
[larger image].
I have always been fascinated by the process of speciation throughout my scientific career because speciation is the "engine" that generates biological diversity. But what are the evolutionary mechanisms that lead to speciation? We know that mate choice can be one important…
grrlscientist | May 31, 2008tags: Alex And Me: A 30-Year Adventure, Alex & Me: Lessons from a Little Bird with a Big Heart, ethology, cognition, learning, parrots, Irene Pepperberg, book review
As a scientist, parrot researcher, aviculturist and parrot companion, I have met Irene Pepperberg several times, at both scientific meetings and also at avicultural meetings, and I have followed her research closely (but quietly) for most of my life. So, when Seed Media, which houses all of ScienceBlogs, asked me if I wanted to read and review Pepperberg's upcoming book, Alex & Me: Lessons from a Little Bird with a Big…
pontiff | May 27, 2008For fun, answer the following in the comment section, without reading what others have left in the comment section:
Linda is 31 years old, single, outspoken, and very bright. She majored in philosophy. As a student, she was deeply concerned with issues of discrimination and social justice, and also participated in anti-nuclear demonstrations.
Which is more likely?
1. Linda is a bank teller.
2. Linda is a bank teller and is active in the feminist movement.
Then read this.
grrlscientist | May 26, 2008tags: parrots, politics, humor, behavior, streaming video
This streaming video is a CNN report about a parrot that .. er, parrots .. Barack Obama's slogan, "Yes we can". But it also includes some other parrots .. the one that says "Whateverrrr" is my favorite [2:31].
grrlscientist | May 23, 2008tags: blog writing, navel gazing
Why do people write blogs? I suppose the reasons underlying this activity are as varied as the writers themselves, but according to an article that was published yesterday, writing a blog might actually be good for your health. As a lifelong compulsive writer, it's unexpected good news to me to learn that something I do naturally and derive a tremendous amount of pleasure from is actually good for my health.
Several scientists are studying blog writing using several different techniques to uncover the beneficial aspects of this activity. But in this article,…
grrlscientist | May 15, 2008tags: golden hamster, pets, behavior, humor, streaming video
I love hamsters. In this streaming video, we get to see something that I loved to do with my pet golden hamster, Caesar, when I was a kid; I would see how much food he could stuff into his face. I would actually count the number of seeds he crammed in there. Watching this video makes me want to get .. you guessed it .. another hamster! AIIEEE! [2:07].
grrlscientist | May 14, 2008tags: parrot, amazon parrot, behavior, mimicking behavior, streaming video
This streaming video shows a talented amazon parrot that appeared recently on Animal Planet. [3:19].