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The relationship between yield loss and grazing pressure: implications for goose management
Grazing by geese can cause a lot of damage to agricultural crops. Goose management aims to reduce such damages, for example by actively reducing population sizes. -
Seasonal timing of growth and reproduction: ultimate functions and proximate mechanisms
For many species, there is only a short period in the annual cycle in which conditions are suitable for reproduction or growth. -
Wild clocks
We study the selection and evolution of circadian clocks in wild birds via measurements of rhythms in the wild and in the laboratory -
BioClock
Our night sky is heavily light-polluted which has a far-reaching impact on our ecosystem, changing daily and seasonal timing of a multitude of organisms we share our environment with. At the NIOO-KNAW, we team up with ecologists and chronobiologists all across the Netherlands to restore healthy rhythms for ourselves and in our natural environment. -
What makes innovative animals innovative?
Innovation ability allows animals to invent plastic behavioural responses to various novel ecological challenges, thereby making it possible to exploit new resources. Until now, studies have generally focused on innovation ability as a factor on its own and very little is known about how various cognitive and behavioural traits co-operate in their effect on innovation ability. These traits may be cognitive and behavioural specializations, meaning they have evolved for specific functions other than innovation, but act together to allow animals to innovate. The behavioural and cognitive traits that may affect innovation ability will vary between species and between populations of the same species living in different environments. My main purpose in this project is to try, by as many means as possible, to pinpoint core differences between innovators and non-innovators. I aim to do this by making both inter- and intraspecific comparisons of performance in cognitive and behavioural essays in three species from Paridae family. -
HabQual: Habitat matching or local adaptation: how does habitat quality drive variation in cognitive traits
This project will help us to predict the limits for species to adapt to changes in habitat characteristics, which is especially important in the light of actual ecological impacts of habitat changes worldwide. -
SPI-Birds Network and Database
SPI-Birds Network and Database (www.spibirds.org) is a centralized and community-driven initiative that connects researchers working on wild bird populations in which individuals are uniquely marked and recognized. SPI-Birds makes research groups and their datasets visible, provides systematic data archiving, ensures data quality and integrity, and facilitates data sharing and comparative, cross-dataset analyses. For this purpose, we have developed a data standard and series of data quality checks agreed upon by the community, which adhere to the FAIR principles. -
Signatures of exposure to pollutants and diseases in urban and rural habitats
Urban environments are ever expanding and differ markedly from natural and rural ecosystems. We study how exposure to toxins, the prevalence of zoonotic pathogens, and the interaction between these stressors differs between these contrasting environments in birds. -
GooseModel: Towards sustainable management of geese in Europe
The increasing impact caused by migratory and sedentary goose populations to economic activities and natural ecosystems in Europe has been a reason of concern for many governments.