Animals/Science

moutuakilla

I am currently working on a research project, which is a collaboration between the Natural History Museum and Sheffield University, looking at evolution in birds. We are looking at every species on the planet and investigating what has caused the creation of new species, evolution of new traits, and potential causes for extinctions.

One of the aims of the project is to make scientific data more readily available, so all of the data will be open source, allowing any research group that is interested to carry out their own studies on the data set. The work basically involves collecting data on bird morphology (body measurements) using a variety of techniques including 3D scanning, and bird plumage using UV photography.

A personal aim is to get more people interested in scientific research, and to disseminate our work so that it is more interesting and accessible to a wider variety of people. To this end I have started writing a blog about different bird species, with the aim of keeping it basic, but allowing people to find out more by providing further links if they wish to delve deeper into the research.

Bit random for a football forum, but the season is over, and I thought some of you might be interested in learning a bit more about the birds of this world. Anyway, there should be at least one post a week, which should be a little bit interesting and informative. Always welcome feedback if you like it or otherwise. I have only started doing it this week, so there is not too much material on there yet.

If anyone is interested, here is the link:

http://macroevolution.group.shef.ac.uk/blog/

If no I’ll just quietly sink to the bottom of the page

Off_it

Good luck mate, but I'd be surprised if many on here knew the first thing about birds.

Trains on the other hand, all over it.

SuedeAdidas

Titfield Thunderbolt?

Brendan_O_Connell

Off_it said:

Good luck mate, but I'd be surprised if many on here knew the first thing about birds.

Trains on the other hand, all over it.

I know how to piss birds off (judging by another thread today!!)

Chizz

Can I be the first to suggest you should tweet this?

moutuakilla

https://twitter.com/MacrobirdEvol All over it, but thanks for the feedback

AddickUpNorth

Interesting read. Birds aren't my forte but I'm always up for expanding my knowledge of who and what we share this planet with.

Busterblitz

Sounds like a great gig that, though every species sounds like quite an ask! Did we speak a while back on here on something bird/Ecuador related?

Those beak scans on the twitter page are pretty amazing.

Dave2l

There's a good documentary about Russel Wallace.

That is mostly to do with birds of paradise.

Bill bailey goes Borneo and gives recognition Wallace deserves that should/could be in equal measure with Darwin.

jonseventyfive

As I no longer work, my garden has taken on new meaning, always grown a lot of stuff, living in rural area means we get plenty of visits from all sorts of critters, every year blue tits move into the same extractor cover meaning we leave that fan well alone until they go, lots feeding going on now so not much longer until we can use that room fully again.

seth plum

I once saw a hen harrier in Scotland which I thought was pretty cool.

jonseventyfive

Hen harrier takes some beating, locally we have a growing population of red kites, not sure how rare they are but are a good size when adult.

moutuakilla

Busterblitz said:

Sounds like a great gig that, though every species sounds like quite an ask! Did we speak a while back on here on something bird/Ecuador related?

Those beak scans on the twitter page are pretty amazing.

We've managed about 30% of the worlds species so far, should be done by next september. Don't recall a chat about Ecuador, although I would love to go there!

nth_london_addick

Drive up the m40 red kites everywhere between London and Oxford,

Lots of owls in letchworth and Stevenage

Leuth

This is totally up my street, cheers

nth_london_addick

We took part In the rspb survey this year was a great way to spend an afternoon with the kids

brogib

We've got a Kingfisher on our pond and sometimes a pair of Great Black Woodpecker (Ones with the red heads) in the garden an all.

Also, anyone ever seen a black and white Blackbird? Coz there's one in our woods and it ain't a magpie or pied wagtail, 100% Blackbird with white bits on it.

moutuakilla

brogib said:

We've got a Kingfisher on our pond and sometimes a pair of Great Black Woodpecker (Ones with the red heads) in the garden an all.

Also, anyone ever seen a black and white Blackbird? Coz there's one in our woods and it ain't a magpie or pied wagtail, 100% Blackbird with white bits on it.

Could have partial albinism

brogib

Yeah, I reckon that's what it is as it looks like one of those in the photos


This is the Kingfisher on the pond, he's got a little fish in one of the photo

JohnBoyUK

Nice blog.

I've spent the last 14 years working in three different Research Administration offices in the Uni of London - KCL, Birkbeck and now QMUL. Have seen first hand how passionate academics are with their research!

cabbles

@moutuakilla not exactly bird related but I really enjoyed this ted talk on the evolution of and descendant from the dinosaur that could be established looking at the common chicken. Fascinating to compare the wing of the chicken with the leg of the dinosaur

http://www.ted.com/talks/jack_horner_building_a_dinosaur_from_a_chicken

Stig

Loved that hoatzin video. It looks like it wouldn't be out of place at a Red Bull Flugtag.

moutuakilla

cabbles said:

@moutuakilla not exactly bird related but I really enjoyed this ted talk on the evolution of and descendant from the dinosaur that could be established looking at the common chicken. Fascinating to compare the wing of the chicken with the leg of the dinosaur

http://www.ted.com/talks/jack_horner_building_a_dinosaur_from_a_chicken

Sounds really interesting, I will check it out when I get back from holiday on Monday. Thanks!

moutuakilla

The Pileated Woodpecker is next up! Will be a few more coming this week too.

Here is a pciture of of latest phylogeny showing how much we have done. Over 30% now!

Red_in_SE8

moutuakilla said:

I am currently working on a research project, which is a collaboration between the Natural History Museum and Sheffield University, looking at evolution in birds. We are looking at every species on the planet and investigating what has caused the creation of new species, evolution of new traits, and potential causes for extinctions.


http://macroevolution.group.shef.ac.uk/blog/

If no I’ll just quietly sink to the bottom of the page

I am very surprised to see you use the term 'creation of new species' in this context given your obvious scientific background. It is wrong and faciltates religious nutters/apologists to persist with their anti-evolution arguments. Species are not created. Birds, like all animals have been evolving over millions of years and new species are simply the result of man deciding to classify and name a specific group of animals who appear to be the result of a particular evolutionary path.

PL54

I dropped my littlest at Nursery this morning and they had 2 just-fledged Wrens (pretty sure) in a box as they were found in the garden / playground when the staff turned up.

They couldn't stay there so I put them in the hedge at the end of my garden - good luck to them. Cats don't go anywhere near my garden anymore.

brogib

PL54 said:

I dropped my littlest at Nursery this morning and they had 2 just-fledged Wrens (pretty sure) in a box as they were found in the garden / playground when the staff turned up.

They couldn't stay there so I put them in the hedge at the end of my garden - good luck to them. Cats don't go anywhere near my garden anymore.

Wrens, my favourite song bird

moutuakilla

Red_in_SE8 said:

moutuakilla said:

I am currently working on a research project, which is a collaboration between the Natural History Museum and Sheffield University, looking at evolution in birds. We are looking at every species on the planet and investigating what has caused the creation of new species, evolution of new traits, and potential causes for extinctions.


http://macroevolution.group.shef.ac.uk/blog/

If no I’ll just quietly sink to the bottom of the page

I am very surprised to see you use the term 'creation of new species' in this context given your obvious scientific background. It is wrong and faciltates religious nutters/apologists to persist with their anti-evolution arguments. Species are not created. Birds, like all animals have been evolving over millions of years and new species are simply the result of man deciding to classify and name a specific group of animals who appear to be the result of a particular evolutionary path.

I see you have just decided to hone in on my use of laymans terms, instead of reading the articles or what the project is about. The project is clearly based on evolution and has nothing to do with creationism. I really don't think me posting some fun articles about birds facilitates religious nutters...

moutuakilla

brogib said:

PL54 said:

I dropped my littlest at Nursery this morning and they had 2 just-fledged Wrens (pretty sure) in a box as they were found in the garden / playground when the staff turned up.

They couldn't stay there so I put them in the hedge at the end of my garden - good luck to them. Cats don't go anywhere near my garden anymore.

Wrens, my favourite song bird

Didn't realise they were the most populous species in the UK until recently

Red_in_SE8

moutuakilla said:

Red_in_SE8 said:

moutuakilla said:

I am currently working on a research project, which is a collaboration between the Natural History Museum and Sheffield University, looking at evolution in birds. We are looking at every species on the planet and investigating what has caused the creation of new species, evolution of new traits, and potential causes for extinctions.


http://macroevolution.group.shef.ac.uk/blog/

If no I’ll just quietly sink to the bottom of the page

I am very surprised to see you use the term 'creation of new species' in this context given your obvious scientific background. It is wrong and faciltates religious nutters/apologists to persist with their anti-evolution arguments. Species are not created. Birds, like all animals have been evolving over millions of years and new species are simply the result of man deciding to classify and name a specific group of animals who appear to be the result of a particular evolutionary path.

I see you have just decided to hone in on my use of laymans terms, instead of reading the articles or what the project is about. The project is clearly based on evolution and has nothing to do with creationism. I really don't think me posting some fun articles about birds facilitates religious nutters...

I know it is not about creationism without having to read the articles. But just because you are using layman terms does not mean you can be so inaccurate. Clearly species are not created. They only exist as a result of man's classification systems. It just grates with me. But I don't want to hijack what could be an interesting thread over the next few months. So, I am not going get into an argument about it.

Stig

Interesting article (I'm enjoying this fledgling series mouatakilla. I don't understand the scanning picture though (although it looks very pretty). What does that mean? And for cuteness, that chick video is fantastic.