Shell Games: How different Hermit Crabs coexist

From: “Shell resource partitioning as a mechanism of coexistence in two co-occurring terrestrial hermit crab species”, S. Steibl & C. Laforsch (2020), BMC Ecology 20:1 https://doi.org/10.1186/s12898-019-0268-2 A fairly fundamental concept in ecology and evolutionary ecology is the competitive exclusion principle – that complete competitors cannot coexist. That is, a situation in which two species which …

Bright Lights, Bold Lizards? How invasive species thrive in urban areas

From: “Urban invaders are not bold risk-takers: a study of three invasive lizards in Southern California”, B.J. Putman, G.B. Pauly, and D.T. Blumstein (2020), Current Zoology zoaa015 https://doi.org/10.1093/cz/zoaa015 Invasive species have become a major headache for conservationists worldwide, causing problems ranging from rats damaging isolated seabird populations by eating their eggs to Japanese knotweed choking …

How shelducks decide on their travel plans

From: “Consistent habitat preference underpins the geographically divergent autumn migration of individual Mongolian common shelducks”, F. Meng, X. Wang, N. Batbayer, T. Natsagdorj, B. Davaasuren, I. Damba, L. Cao, and A.D. Fox (2019), Current Zoology 56 https://doi.org/10.1093/cz/zoz056 Common Shelducks (Tadorna tadorna) are a largish species of black, white and brown ducks found across Europe, Asia …

When does a bird decide to fly? Adventures in Flight Initiation Distance

From “Anti-predator behavior along elevational and latitudinal gradients in dark-eyed juncos”, M. Andrade, D.T. Blumstein (2019), Current Zoology zoz046 https://doi.org/10.1093/cz/zoz046 The vast majority of wild animals will, if a person walks towards them, run or fly away. For something so commonsense and easily taken for granted, this is actually quite poorly understood as a phenomenon. …

Is there a downside to flight? Looking for trade-offs in bush-crickets

From: “Contrasting patterns  of  macroptery  in  Roesel’s  bush  cricket  Metrioptera  roeselii  (Orthoptera,  Ensifera)”, S. Szanyi, A. Nagy, I.A. Rácz, Z. Varga (2014), Estonian Journal of Ecology 63:4 doi: 10.3176/eco.2014.4.07 Click to access ecol-2014-4-299-311.pdf Roesel’s bush-crickets (Metrioptera roeselii) have been presenting an interesting problem to scientists in recent years. Why? Because they have been expanding across …

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