Birds have many kinds of internal and external parasites, including viruses, bacteria and
fungi, as well as protozoa, helminths and arthropods. Because parasites have negative …

Total blood haemoglobin concentration is increasingly being used to assess physiological
condition in wild birds, although it has not been explicitly recognized how reliably this …

Charles Darwin's experiences in the Galápagos Islands in 1835 helped to guide his
thoughts toward a revolutionary theory: that species were not fixed but diversified from their …

40 Years of Evolution is a landmark study of the finches first made famous by Charles
Darwin, one that documents as never before the evolution of species through natural …

Birds are plagued by an impressive diversity of ectoparasites, ranging from feather-feeding
lice, to feather-degrading bacteria. Many of these ectoparasites have severe negative effects …

Species hybridization can lead to fitness costs, species collapse, and novel evolutionary
trajectories in changing environments. Hybridization is predicted to be more common when …

Understanding host-parasite interactions requires that the multi-faceted relationships among
ecological, behavioral and molecular processes be characterized and integrated. The …

The fly, Philornis downsi Dodge & Aitken, was first collected in 1964 on the Galápagos
Islands and is now widespread across the archipelago. Virtually nothing is known about the …

Introduced parasites threaten native host species that lack effective defenses. Such
parasites increase the risk of extinction, particularly in small host populations like those on …

Research on the costs of nest reuse is central to understanding the population ecology and
evolution of cavity-nesting birds. We explored the consequences of nest reuse by offering …