A local Cambridge Brownie group (girls aged 7-10) spent a session with Mairenn Attwood, learning all about African cuckoos. Alongside discovering the tricks used by brood parasites, the Brownies also had a go at creating their own egg spoons. In the field, these are used to reach eggs in nests which are high and far out along tree branches. The outcome is shown in the photo above – despite their varied appearance, all were successful at extracting chocolate eggs from pretend nests!
Our paper “Categorical identity signatures can reduce host error rates during brood parasitism” has been published in the journal PLoS Biology.
Dr Chima Nwaogu visited the Animal Ecology Unit at the Evolutionsbiologisk centrum (EBC) at Uppsala University, Sweden, to present the 2025 Christer Hemborg lecture. He gave a research lecture on why Afrotropical birds breed when they do, based on analyses of breeding records derived from Major John Colebrook-Robjent’s egg collection currently held at the Livingstone Museum. He explored how the effects of pre-rain tree green-up and rainfall onset differentially drive invertebrate and grass seed abundance, influencing multiple seasonal bird breeding patterns throughout the year.
Our paper “Pigment concentrations only partially predict avian eggshell colour mimicry in a polymorphic host–brood parasite system” has been published in the journal Biology Letters.
Mairenn Attwood’s paper ‘How do parasites and predators choose their victim? A trade-off between quality and vulnerability across antagonistic interactions’ is out now in the journal Biological Reviews.