CITY BIRDS ARE BETTER PROBLEM-SOLVERS

[HuckleB]

http://conservationmagazine.org/2016/04/city-birds-better-problem-solvers/

"Birds that live in urban areas are better at figuring out how to access new sources of food compared to rural birds of the same species, says a new study. City birds also show stronger immune responses than their country cousins, perhaps because urban life brings them into contact with a wider array of pathogens.

The study is part of a larger body of research exploring what characteristics enable species to thrive in human-dominated landscapes. Scientists reason that in the urban wild, birds have to be opportunistic, flexible, and innovative to take advantage of food sources provided (deliberately or not) by people. And they have to be willing to tolerate the noise and hubbub of people and traffic in cities.

To test these predictions, researchers from McGill University captured 50 Barbados bullfinches (Loxigilla barbadensis) and brought them back to the laboratory for behavioral and physiological tests. This species does well in both wild and developed parts of Barbados, and the researchers captured birds from eight different sites representing a rural-to-urban gradient on the Caribbean island.

Urban Barbados bullfinches have a stronger reaction than do rural ones to an injection of a compound called phytohemagglutinin, the researchers reported recently in Behavioral Ecology. This is a standard test of immune function and suggests that the urban birds have more robust immune responses, a finding in line with other studies.

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Berry birdy interesting.

[Liz_Estrada]

1. Great article

Thanks for posting!