The birds and the bees: how do different organisms use the same information?

Maria Tello Ramos, Research Fellow, School of Biology, University of St Andrews

Wednesday 28th February, 1-2pm, Cottrell 2V1 and streamed on Teams (contact the seminar organiser for the Teams link).
This seminar is open to all staff, students and affiliates of the University of Stirling. The seminar is hosted by Biological and Environmental Sciences (BES). 

Who this might appeal to: The talk should be of interest to behavioural ecologist in general and those working in insects and bird behaviour. My talk should overlap with the evolving organisms research group. I will talk about convergence in cognition, so it should also be of interest to people studying cognition in general. I plan to give a talk that is suitable for research staff and postgraduate students.

Abstract: Different animals solve ecological problems in a myriad of ways. Some animals navigate by following stars, others follow smells and others count steps. All solutions get animals where they need to go, and different solutions depend on what information animals have available at a time and how they process that information. More remarkable still, is when vastly different species like hummingbirds and bees behave analogously, seemingly solving cognitive problems in the same way. The size of a hummingbird’s brain is not only orders of magnitude larger than that of a bee, but its morphology is also vastly different. And yet, their foraging from hundreds of flowers in a day is equally effective. While hummingbirds and bees seem to converge in the types of information they can learn when foraging from a single flower (e.g., colour, location, time of day), recent experiments suggest that when solving multiple-destination problems, these animals use different strategies: from the outset hummingbirds develop repeatable routes by visiting each nearest neighbouring flower, while bees develop optimal routes through trial and error. Does this mean that hummingbirds and bees use information differently? I will discuss how comparing the foraging behaviour of these two very different taxa can help us understand how different brains faced with solving a similar task may direct attention, perceive, or process information in different ways.

Bio: I am a cognitive ecologist specialized in studying behaviour in wild birds. I received my PhD from the University of St Andrews where I am currently working as a research fellow in a project aimed at understanding the major transitions in the evolution of cognition by comparing the cognitive abilities of hummingbirds and bees. At the same time, I am also interested in how multiple individuals can coordinate their individual behaviour and for this, I study the building behaviour white-browed sparrow weavers in South Africa. It turns out, that these birds are not only cooperative breeders but also cooperative builders. To better understand how different cognitive abilities have evolved, I have studied the cognitive abilities of different species around the world, each allowing me to answer a different question.

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