behavior
grrlscientist | June 8, 2009tags: dancing bird, Wire-tailed manakin, Pipra filicauda, behavior, ornithology, birds, nature, streaming video
This streaming video records the dance of a male Wire-tailed manakin, Pipra filicauda, a lovely passerine species endemic to the lower areas near rivers in the rainforests of northeastern Peru, southeastern Colombia, eastern Ecuador and western Brazil [1:30]
grrlscientist | June 2, 2009tags: Post-Traumatic Embitterment Disorder, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, Adaptation disorder, stress reaction, Adjustment disorder, Negative life events, psychology, behavior, psychiatry, peer-reviewed paper
[larger view]
In this economy, nearly everyone has experienced unemployment, bankruptcy, foreclosure, divorce, or some combination thereof. But roughly 1-2% of these people become so stressed out by these losses that "they can barely function other than to ruminate about their circumstances," according to Dr. Michael Linden, the German psychiatrist who described and named Post-…
grrlscientist | May 14, 2009tags: TEDTalks, Joshua Klein, birds, crows, ornithology, animal behavior, streaming video
In this video, Hacker and writer Joshua Klein talks about his fascination with crows. (Notice the gleam of intelligence in their little black eyes?) After a long amateur study of corvid behavior, he's come up with an elegant machine that may form a new bond between animal and human. (2008) [9:47]
sb admin | May 7, 2009
Oecophylla longinoda - Weaver Ants
St. Lucia, Kwazulu-Natal, South Africa
Technical details:
Lens: Canon 35mm f2.0 lens on a 12mm extension tube
Body: Canon EOS 20D dSLR
Flash: Canon MT-24EX twin flash, hand-held for backlighting.
Settings: ISO 400, f/13, 1/160 sec
awild | May 5, 2009
It has long been known that ants recognize their deceased nestmates using the smell of fatty acids that accumulate as the body decomposes. The chemical signature of deadness helps ants remove the corpses from their midst, keeping a clean and sanitary nest. Indeed, this classic tale of ants and oleic acid is one of E. O. Wilson's favorite stories.
But it turns out that the story is even richer than previously supposed. A study by Dong-Hwan Choe et al published in yesterday's PNAS note that Argentine ants (Linepithema humile) carry away the dead even before the fatty acids appear. It…
pontiff | May 1, 2009In his latest New York Times op-ed column, David Brooks, the conservative liberals can most stomach, attempts to tackle the problem of "what makes a genius". This is, of course, the kind of reasonable length topic that one can explain in a single newspaper column (it's the New York Times, you now.) The article begins, like all great op-ed, with a strawman that would make Dorothy proud:Some people live in romantic ages. They tend to believe that genius is the product of a divine spark. They believe that there have been, throughout the ages, certain paragons of greatness -- Dante, Mozart,…
purepedantry | April 27, 2009Razib and I have a discussion up at Bloggingheads.tv about genetics and behavior as well as a brief discussion of neuroeconomics. Check it out below the fold:
laelaps | April 14, 2009Evolutionary anthropology is a subject that has traditionally been dominated by a focus on males, or at least "masculine" behaviors like hunting. The most popular images of our own ancestors have often been of a group of males setting out for a hunt or crouched over a freshly-killed carcass. It is as if our evolution was driven by male ambition. Such tendencies have triggered some backlash, from the relatively absurd (i.e. the aquatic ape hypothesis) to more reasoned critiques (i.e. Woman the Gatherer), but it is clear that our understanding of our own history is most certainly biased by…
grrlscientist | April 5, 2009tags: Eurasian Jackdaw, Corvus monedula, body language, behavior, peer-reviewed paper
Eurasian Jackdaw, Corvus monedula.
This is the smallest species of corvid (crows and ravens).
Image: Wikipedia [larger view].
Those of you who go birding will know what I am talking about when I say that birds are so capable of reading human body language that they know when we are looking at them, which frequently causes them to hide from our gaze. However, this capacity has never before been scientifically studied in birds, until now, that is.
A newly published paper studied handraised, tame Eurasian…
grrlscientist | April 3, 2009tags: captive dolphins, SeaWorld Orlando, bubble ring, animal behavior, streaming video
This streaming video shows the dolphins at SeaWorld Orlando's Dolphin Cove as they artfully create and play with underwater bubble rings and hear what SeaWorlds trainers, educators and guests have to say about this fun and fascinating behavior [3:25]
grrlscientist | April 2, 2009tags: woolly false vampire bat, Chrotopterus auritus, wrinkled-faced bat, Centurio senex, animal behavior, streaming video
This streaming video shows the hunting behavior of one species of bat, the woolly false vampire bat, Chrotopterus auritus, as it hunts down another species of bat, a frugivorous wrinkled-faced bat, Centurio senex, then kills and eats it. For some odd reason, this video reminds me of Wall Street [1:23]
laelaps | March 23, 2009You may recall that last December I shared a clip or two from Isabella Rossellini's delightful short film series on the mating habits of insects called "Green Porno." Some viewers were fascinated, others horrified, but regardless of your reaction you might be interested to know that on April 1st Rossellini will be back with a slew of new shorts for the second season of Green Porno.
Whereas the original run focused on insects the new season will feature sea creatures. (Among the episodes are "Why Vagina", "Whale", and "Angler".) Here is a promotional clip for the upcoming shorts;
I can't wait.
grrlscientist | March 22, 2009tags: evolutionary biology, mate choice, sex determination, genetic compatibility, behavioral ecology, Gouldian Finch, Erythrura gouldiae, peer-reviewed paper
The three color morphs of Gouldian finches, Erythrura gouldiae.
Image: Sarah Pryke, Macquarie University.
Gouldian finches, Erythrura gouldiae, are small cavity-nesting passerines that are endemic to open savannahs adjacent to mangrove swamps in northern Australia. These finches eat a variety of native grass seeds, but to meet the increased energetic and nutritional demands of rearing chicks, they primarily eat insects when breeding…
awild | March 22, 2009From the recent documentary Ants: Nature's Secret Power, a glimpse of how researchers study ant behavior in the lab:
grrlscientist | March 6, 2009tags: The Science of Cuteness, cute overload, baby animals, behavior, streaming video
The "science of YouTube" guys are back, with a look at the true meaning of cute web videos [2:33]
grrlscientist | February 27, 2009tags: vervet monkeys, animal behavior, alcohol, streaming video
This streaming video explores alcohol use (and abuse) among a group of feral vervet monkeys on the Caribbean island of St. Kitts. Interestingly, the patterns of alcohol use and abuse closely mirror those found in humans. The sound on this video is very quiet, so you will have to turn up the volume to hear the narrator [3:13]
grrlscientist | February 22, 2009tags: frog jesus, religion, animal behavior, streaming video
Just in time for Sunday! This streaming video documents a nostalgic voyage that takes a darker turn, exploring the naiveté of mankind through the eyes of a young boy. [1:17]
grrlscientist | February 21, 2009tags: Octopus, shark, animal behavior, streaming video
What happens when you keep a shark and an octopus in the same aquarium? [2:45]
grrlscientist | February 19, 2009tags: Clever Hans, A Dog Named Maggie, animal behavior, body language, streaming video
This streaming video documents a dog named Maggie and her trainer, who has taught her to resist temptation as well as to read body language. [3:39]
awild | February 17, 2009Pheidole dentata, older worker with larva.
A study out in pre-print by Muscedere, Willey, and Traniello in the journal Animal Behaviour finds little support for a long-held idea that worker ants change specializations to perform different types of work as they age. By creating colonies out of different age classes in the ant Pheidole dentata, the researchers showed that older workers were good at pretty much everything, while younger ants performed only a few tasks, but did those less efficiently. Here is the abstract:
Age-related task performance, or temporal polyethism, is a prominent…