Cowbirds are crazier than you think…check out the research by Meredith West and Andrew King on the role of female cowbirds (who don’t sing) in shaping the development of juvenile males' song by using rapid wing gestures: http://www.indiana.edu/~aviary/Research/female%20visual%20displays.pdf and more generally, http://www.indiana.edu/~aviary/Publications.htm
Cheers, Mike On Apr 10, 2020, at 7:49 PM, Peter Saracino <petersarac...@gmail.com<mailto:petersarac...@gmail.com>> wrote: I was having a cup of coffee looking out the window at 3 male and 3 female cowbirds going at the sunflower seeds. As I watched them it dawned on me that all of them were raised by foster parents!!! According to the Lab of O: "the cowbird does not depend exclusively on a single host species; it has been known to parasitize over 220 different species of North American birds". Crazy, wild stuff. Pete Sar -- Cayugabirds-L List Info: Welcome and Basics<http://www.northeastbirding.com/CayugabirdsWELCOME> Rules and Information<http://www.northeastbirding.com/CayugabirdsRULES> Subscribe, Configuration and Leave<http://www.northeastbirding.com/CayugabirdsSubscribeConfigurationLeave.htm> Archives: The Mail Archive<http://www.mail-archive.com/cayugabirds-l@cornell.edu/maillist.html> Surfbirds<http://www.surfbirds.com/birdingmail/Group/Cayugabirds> BirdingOnThe.Net<http://birdingonthe.net/mailinglists/CAYU.html> Please submit your observations to eBird<http://ebird.org/content/ebird/>! -- _______________________________________________________________ Michael H. Goldstein Associate Professor Director, Eleanor J. Gibson Laboratory of Developmental Psychology Director, College Scholar Program Department of Psychology, Cornell University 270 Uris Hall, Ithaca, NY 14853 Office 607-793-0537; Lab 607-254-BABY; Fax 607-255-8433 https://psychology.cornell.edu/michael-h-goldstein Cornell B.A.B.Y. Lab: http://babylab.cornell.edu/ _______________________________________________________________ -- Cayugabirds-L List Info: http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsWELCOME http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsRULES http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsSubscribeConfigurationLeave.htm ARCHIVES: 1) http://www.mail-archive.com/cayugabirds-l@cornell.edu/maillist.html 2) http://www.surfbirds.com/birdingmail/Group/Cayugabirds 3) http://birdingonthe.net/mailinglists/CAYU.html Please submit your observations to eBird: http://ebird.org/content/ebird/ --
