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Project properties |
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| Title | Conflict over parental care: are parents negotiating? |
| Group | Behavioural Ecology |
| Project type | thesis |
| Credits | 30-36 |
| Supervisor(s) | Kat Bebbington
Sjouke Anne Kingma |
| Examiner(s) | Marc Naguib |
| Contact info | sjouke.kingma@wur.nl |
| Begin date | 2020/03/10 |
| End date | 2030/03/10 |
| Description | Since parental care is costly, evolutionary theory states that each parents wants the other parent to do the majority of the work in raising offspring. One proposed mechanism by which parents are predicted to avoid being exploited by the partner is by alternating provisioning of offspring (‘turn-taking’). In this project we will monitor offspring provisioning of bulbuls, small passerine birds in Eswatini, to determine whether parents takes turns in food provisioning – and how this affects offspring growth and survival. |
| Used skills | Fieldwork, behaviour observations, nest searching and observation, bird catching |
| Requirements | The fieldwork takes place in the savanna of Eswatini in Southern Africa; an adventurous attitude is an advantage: the fieldsite is beautiful but remote and accommodation is basic. |