From me to you: communicating stress in avian systems

Stephen Ferguson, PhD will be our Science Workshop speaker this week, and will be speaking to us remotely via Zoom on the topic of "From me to you: communicating stress in avian systems."

Stressors come in many forms: temperature, lack of food, access to water, competition and more. Vertebrate responses to stress are nearly as varied, encompassing both physiological and behavioral coping mechanisms. But what are the social effects of those changes? Could they even induce stress responses in others, without exposing them to the original source of stress? Using a combination of field and lab experiments involving Florida scrub-jays, tree swallows, and zebra finches we have explored both direct and indirect consequences of these physiological and behavioral modifications in the individual, in mates, and in their offspring.