Next Monday, February 13, will be the next monthly meeting of the Cayuga Bird Club. Jennifer Walsh-Emond, PhD, an NSF postdoctoral fellow in the Fuller Evolutionary Biology program at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, will give her presentation, "How Adaptations to Tidal Marshes Shape Differences between Saltmarsh and Nelson's Sparrows: Lessons from the Field and Laboratory". The harsh conditions found in tidal marshes make them suitable breeding homes for only a few bird species that are particularly well adapted to their challenging environmental conditions. In my work, I use salt marsh-adapted sparrows as a kind of natural experiment to explore how bird species adapt to new habitats. Saltmarsh and Nelson's sparrows are two recently diverged, hybridizing tidal marsh specialists that inhabit marshes along the coast of New England. Although these birds appear superficially similar, they have fascinating differences in habitat affinity, morphology, genetics, and behavior that reflect their associations with salt marsh environments over evolutionary time. These birds are increasingly threatened by the loss of salt marshes caused by habitat alteration and rising sea levels; my work helps place these threats in a broader evolutionary context by showing how these species likely arose through their different adaptations to coastal-upland habitats, which in turn led to their reproductive isolation.The meeting will be held at the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology. Doors open at 7:00 pm and there will be cookies and conversation starting at 7:15. Bird club business begins at 7:30 pm followed by the presentation. All are welcome.Members are invited to join Jennifer for dinner at Aladdin's in Collegetown just before the meeting at 5:30 p.m. Please RSVP to Colleen Richards at cl...@juno.com by noon Monday so reservations can be made.Colleen RichardsCorresponding SecretaryCayuga Bird Club ____________________________________________________________ This Simple Step To Flawless Skin Gundry MD http://thirdpartyoffers.juno.com/TGL3141/589d3519b5c0c35197837st03duc --
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