Social Behavior -- includes nonbreeding and breeding activities

1. Social Behavior -- includes nonbreeding and breeding activities -- how birds interact with each other, space themselves, and maintain high fitness and survival -- feeding flocks common, especially in winter -- allow greater protection from predators, facilitates food gathering, saves energy from trying to keep individual territories -- some examples previously given: Harris’ Hawk, Western Gull and gull ‘gangs’, Double-crested cormorants swimming in formation to herd schools of fish

2. Blackbirds, including starlings, red-winged blackbird, and grackles are well known for their huge winter flocks that can number in the hundreds of thousands

3. Short-tailed Shearwater, Alaska alaska.usgs.gov

5. Mixed species feeding flocks also common in winter -- provides greater protection to all individuals -- each species knows each others’ alarm calls -- can form for just an hour or the day -- may learn new foraging strategies by watching others -- no interspecific competition for food as each species has its own niche (e.g., warblers, chickadees, titmice, and woodpeckers feeding and moving together) -- seabird feeding flocks with diving, dipping behaviors among different species

6. Feeding Guild A group of species feeding on the same resource in different ways

7. Vultures along can strip a zebra carcass of all flesh in 30 minutes flickr.com

8. Roosting flocks also possible -- birds forage individually in day, flock together at one site for night -- crows and ravens, vultures, ibis, herons, blackbirds, gulls and some shorebirds especially known for this -- many advantages: 1. Predator avoidance/protection 2. Thermoregulation 3. Information exchange 4. Develop pair bonds

9. Pygmy Nuthatch Family Sittidae

10. Nuthatches drill their own cavities, use for winter roosting as well as breeding

11. naturalmoment.com Roost cavities become important for thermoregulation at night in winter Record roost for pygmy nuthatch in Flagstaff, AZ, winter 1981-82 10 winter social groups converged on one cavity from as far away as 1.7 km, total in cavity was 167, most ever recorded

12. Gull ‘clubs’ Breeding and non-breeding season, gather at dusk or hang out all day Non-breeders may establish pair bonds here, mate for life, practice building nests, and build social skills

13. Behavioral Ecology in Birds Field pioneered by Konrad Lorenz and Niko Tinbergen, 1950s and 60s Set foundation for modern behavioral studies Lorenz (1903-1989) was an Austrian ornithologist Famous for work on imprinting behavior in Greylag Geese

14. Lorenz is considered the ‘father of ethology’, or study of animal behavior Besides research on imprinting behavior, also studied innate behavior and ‘fixed action patterns’ e.g., gull chicks always respond to red dot on adult bill by begging for food, pecking on spot to stimulate regurgitation of food by adult Used models to illustrate how the behavior is innate Greylag goose and FAP

15. Niko Tinbergen (Dutch ornithologist, 1907-1988) Studied behavior of Herring Gulls Proposed that any behavior should be examined in terms of causation, ontogeny, adaptation, and phylogeny Shared 1973 Nobel Prize with Konrad Lorenz and Karl von Frisch

16. Causation • Internal factors • Hormonal • Physiological • External factors • Changes in season, photoperiod impacting hormones and behavior

17. Ontogeny • Studying how individual behaviors develop • Innate vs. learned • “Double-scratch” of New World sparrows • Rapid backwards kick performed with both feet to clear superficial layer of the surface (feeding) • Innate--appears in isolated and hand-raised birds • Environmental influence on learned behaviors http://eema-le.blogspot.com/2009_04_01_archive.html

18. Adaptation • How behavior functions for: • Survival • Improving fitness • Reproductive success e.g., winter attendance in murres and gulls Habituation to save energy

19. Phylogeny • Behaviors can be inherited or innate (passed on from generation to generation) • Become characters for determining phylogenetic relationships • Courtship displays (Stereotyped movements & vocalizations) • Urohydrosis (Ciconiiformes) http://www.calacademy.org/blogs/rainforest/?p=620

20. Innate behavior • Behaviors that require no learning, are genetically controlled • Simple reflex behavior and fixed action patterns • Feeding and begging behaviors • Gulls chicks peck at red spot on adult bill • Making begging calls when adult returns to nest • Desire to incubate eggs • Common murre, penguins

21. Learned behavior • Opposite of innate • Young or adult birds watching other adults and mimicking • Learn new skills for foraging, defense, etc. • Classic example: Titmice in England and milk bottles • at least 11 species of birds learned this behavior within 10 years http://www.corbisimages.com/stock-photo/rights-managed/FL003273/blue-tit-drinking-from-milk-bottle

22. Studying animal behavior • Blind observations • See large part of colony • Sit comfortably without disturbing birds • Establish methods for systematic observations • Quantify results from counting and coding observations

23. Penguin predation study • Research questions: • Are birds on the edge more susceptible to predation? • Do predators vary their activities with time of day and season?

24. 2 hr observations beginning at 6-8am, extending throughout the day • Score behaviors by predators: • Searching • Attempts • Successful predation • Record codes while observing, add codes to computer later • Allows statistical analysis of behavioral observations landcareresearch.co.nz