A winter wonderland

You may or may not have noticed the dearth of posts in recent months. A few folks have bothered to point this out via email, leading me to believe this blog doesn't go entirely unread. My excuse - which I think is a good one - is that I've been busy finishing up my Master's thesis. Having successfully defended not too long ago, I am now free to function like a normal human being again. And for a nerd like me, that includes posting about research at QUBS.

As it happens, this is a perfect time to resume blogging, as I am currently tromping through the snowy forests of QUBS in search of black-capped chickadees. A PhD candidate in my lab - Jenn Foote - is in the midst of her third and final field season studying these hardy little residents, and I am her trusty field assistant. With an interest in communication during the dawn chorus, each spring she records a whole neighbourhood of chickadees simultaneously using 16 widely spaced microphones. That way, she can study the degree to which birds respond to the songs of their neighbours. She can also determine which birds are the leaders, and which birds are the followers.

Given that thesis topic, you are probably wondering why on earth Jenn would be at QUBS in the depths of winter. And no - it's not because she just can't bear to part with her feathery friends. Crazy as we birders may be, our presence at QUBS is a purposeful one. It has to do with the leader vs follower conundrum I alluded to earlier. In winter chickadees roam through the woods in flocks of 2-12 individuals. Within each flock there is a well-established dominance hierarchy, such that subordinate individuals make way for their more dominant counterparts - especially when it comes to food resources. Jenn wants to know who these dominant birds are, and whether they correspond to the leaders of the dawn chorus in spring.

For insight into these dominance relationships, Jenn baits birds to particular locations by providing seed throughout the winter. She then erects "dominance platforms" (see photo), which consist of a board on which many birds can land, and a seed container from which only one bird can feed. With this set-up, Jenn (and assistants like me) can observe which birds displace others when they are trying to feed.

This technique may sound simple, but is rendered difficult by the fact that interactions take place within the span of a few seconds. During that time the observer must identify the colour-band combination of not one, but two birds, and note which is the more dominant individual. What's more, chickadees are not the only birds to frequent the platforms. They must often wait their turn behind nuthatches, woodpeckers, and the occasional blue jay, so chickadee-chickadee interactions are sometimes few and far between.

Come spring, when the chickadees disband to establish separate breeding territories, Jenn hopes to have observed enough interactions to deduce the dominance hierarchy within each of the wintering flocks. After months of lab work and writing, I'm just happy to be outside again!