Category: New Research
Blog news (3) Books (2) Citizen Science (18) Conference Proceedings (73) Defining Urbanization (6) Guest Post (8) How To (13) Museums/Natural History Collections (3) Natural History Notes (10) New Lit Abstracts (101) New Research (180) New Research Tools (7) Notes from the field (15) Public Outreach (21) sustainable development (1) Uncategorized (38) Urban Environments (48) Urban Evolution in the Media (11) Urban observations (82) Urban Wildlife (9)
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SICB 2020: Lead Pollution of Human Water Supplies Impacts Songbirds
Heavy metals, such as lead and mercury, are common pollutants in human-affected ecosystems, including cities. These metals can bioaccumulate, or reach high concentrations in…
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Natural Selection Favors Black Morph of Eastern Gray Squirrel in Cities
Eastern Gray Squirrels, Sciurus carolinensis, are some of the most visible and well-known urban animals in the Northeastern United States. Prior to European settlement of…
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Pigeon Feet in the City
If you’ve walked around a city with pigeons, you might have noticed that many of them are missing toes or have deformed feet. These…
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Entomology Conference 2019
Entomology 2019 I recently attended the Entomology Conference in St. Louis, Missouri and here are some of the highlights. I was part of the…
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A Tale of Two Amphibians: Urban Landscapes Differentially Impact Gene Flow
When we think of urban organisms, we often don’t think of aquatic organisms. But wetlands exist in the urban matrix, and aquatic and amphibious…
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Novel Methods For Capturing American White Ibises In Urban Areas
Many urban wildlife biologists face unique challenges when trying to capture their study organisms. Traditional methods that are used in remote areas are often…
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Urbanization Influences Gene Flow and Genetic Drift
Recently, I published a review paper in Molecular Ecology with my co-authors, Ruth Rivkin, Marc TJ Johnson, Jason Munshi-South, and Brian Verrelli. In this…
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Metropolitan Lagartixas: Lizards Thriving in Tropical Brazilian City
From Anoles to Indian Agamids to Australian Water Dragons to Western Fence Lizards, lizards from diverse branches of the squamate tree are proving themselves in…
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Black Widows and Urban Heat: Can Spiders Cope With Increased Temperatures?
This week’s post comes from Dale Stevens, who tells us about the effects of elevated urban temperatures on black widow spiders. Along with landscape…
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Urbanization is Correlated with Higher Cholesterol Levels in American Crows
Along with the altered landscape, urban organisms also encounter novel (anthropogenic) food resources. And while anthropogenic food can be abundant in cities, it is…
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Is your bird feeder clean enough to eat off of? Bird feeders may act as reservoirs for disease transmission
When was the last time you cleaned your bird feeder? Bird feeders are a common sight in the city. For many, they represent a…
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City Snails Wear Yellow: Urban Heat Island Drives the Evolution of Shell Colour
(I’m writing this the night of the September 20, 2019 Climate Strike. This is merely the consequence of literal months of procrastinating—the paper I…
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Urbanization Can Influence Plant-Herbivore Interactions
Recently, LITC contributor Sophie Brietbart and myself published a review in Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution as part of a special issue on Arthropod…
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What Do FID Studies Really Tell Us About Boldness?
A common behavioral trend observed in urban animals is that they tend to be bolder compared to their rural counterparts. This behavioral shift can…
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What is the “Indoor Biome”?
The tropics of Trinidad… the gleaming ice of the Arctic… as urban scientists, these are field sites we typically forgo for the sake of…