cuckoo
- Scientists discovered that there's a bird that can detect cuckoo chicks in a nest
- Scientists found that the bird abandoned Hosfiled's bronze-cuckoo chicks to starve in 40% of cases
- The study shows there are two pointers that enable wrens to discriminate against parasitic chicks.
- "The host bird develops its defenses and then the cuckoo counterattacks," -Kilner
- If the defense systems of cuckoos become sophisticated enough, perhaps they will eventually run out of evolutionary tricks and lose the arms race
Reflection:
This story was really interesting to me. I never really knew anything about cuckoos, or any other type of birds. I picked it because it caught my attention. It's interesting to know that there's an arms race between other species besides humans. I'm not very interested in birds, they actually scare me, but this article had a lot of information that I wouldn't have known before. Even though birds aren't a very big part in my life, they still have meanings to nature. They have to live too. I think this article shows that birds are important, and they aren't just left alone. People are actually interested in birds, too.
"Cuckoos, Wrens in Escalating Evolutionary Arms Race." Daily Nature and Science News and Headlines | National Geographic News. 12 Mar. 2003. Web. 17 May 2010. http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2003/03/0311_030312_cuckoo.html
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