THE LINNAEAN SOCIETY OF NEW YORK SPEAKERS PROGRAM
Tuesday, May 10, 2011, 7:30 p.m.
The American Museum of Natural History, Linder Theater
Speaker: Bridget Stutchbury, Professor of Biololgy and Canada Research Chair in
Ecology and Conservation Biology, York University, Toronto
Title: Investigating the Private Lives of Birds
Prof. Stutchbury was the first person to realize that a geolocator--a
device that stores data about the times of sunrises and sunsets and can weigh
as little as a paperclip--could be used to track birds on their migrations. In
the breeding season of 2007, she and the research team she led affixed
geolocators to 34 birds--14 Wood Thrushes and 20 Purple Martins--in one
location in Pennsylvania. When 5 thrushes and 2 martins were trapped back on
the breeding grounds the following summer, the recovered data provided the
first look at the complete migratory route of any bird, a look that changed
many long-held assumptions. In her talk, she will discuss these findings and
the latest information gained from this research.
Scott Weidensaul says of Prof. Stutchbury's recent book, The Bird
Detective, on which this talk is based, "With her trademark clarity and humor,
Bridget Stutchbury--'bird detective' extraordinaire--reveals avian lives of
uncommon drama, rife with adultery, divorce, sibling rivalry, lying, social
climbing and life-or-death marathons--a peek into a world at once familiar and
wonderfully different from our own."
In her role as detective, Prof. Stutchbury uses every available
means--high tech and low--from DNA analysis and geolocators to the old gumshoe
standbys of stakeouts and trailing to snoop into the lives of birds because,
she writes, "Studies of bird behaviour are fascinating in their own right but
also help us to understand if and how birds can adapt to our modern world.
Trying to save birds without understanding what makes them tick is a shot in
the dark. Birds are highly social, and their social needs are at least as
important as their physical needs."
Bridget Stutchbury completed her Master's of Science at Queen's
University and her Ph.D. at Yale and was a post-doctoral fellow and research
associate at the Smithsonian Institution. She is affiliated with more than a
dozen organizations that seek to preserve bird habitat. She has published
numerous papers in scientific journals and is the author not only of The Bird
Detective but also Silence of the Songbirds and co-author with her husband,
E.S. Morton, of Behavioral Ecology of Tropical Songbirds.
The meeting is open to the public, without charge. Please join us for
what promises to be a very exciting talk. Enter the Museum at West 77th Street.
If you would like to meet Prof. Stutchbury before the talk, join us at
Gazala's Restaurant, 380 Columbus Avenue between 78th and 79th Streets, at 6
p.m. The reservation will be in the name of Geoffrey.
Geoffrey Nulle, Vice President
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