STUDY GUIDES: (Click a link to go
to the associated questions)
Reproduction and Physiology
Annual Cycles, Migration,
and Navigation
Conservation
Migration Connectivity
Winter Habitat and Migration
Introductory Lectures (and readings in Gill)
What is a bird?
What characters are important in phylogenetic analyses?
Which are bad?
Why?
What fields of biology have been furthered by studies of birds?
Why do birds make such good study subjects for so many fields of biology?
In what field of biology have birds proved of little help? Why?
What was the Modern Synthesis? What two fields of biology did it unite? When did it occur?
How many species of birds are there in the world?
*How many have there been?
*Why are these numbers so different?
How many orders of birds are there?
Do we know exactly?
Why not?
What is Biogeography?
What biogeographic region are we in here in NC?
What is biodiversity?
Why is the biodiversity of North Carolina particularly rich?
Ornithologists of note:
Give a 2-sentence bio of:
Alexander Wilson
John James Audubon
Roger Tory Peterson
Margaret Morse Nice
Arthur C. Bent
Robert MacArthur
Peter and Rosemary Grant
Ted Parker
Ernst Mayr
(I may also give some facts about these folks and ask you to match a name to the description.)
The Evolution of Flight
How does flight work:
What are the two forces acting on a bird in flight?
What provides the power to overcome these forces?
Which is more important in providing lift: Bernoulli’s Principle or Newton’s 3rd Law
How does each work?
How does turbulence affect lift?
How is this relevant to the "slotted" wings of soaring birds like vultures?
Albatrosses (Procellariformes) are great soarers, but have long, thin wings without the "slotted" effect—why is this?
How else do birds reduce turbulence?
Why do geese fly in V-shaped formation? (Two reasons)
How is the avian skeleton adapted to flight?
What is the Supracoracoideus?
Where is it located?
What’s unusual about this?
What benefit does its location convey?
What are antagonistic muscles?
What do we mean by "origin" and "insertion" of muscles?
What are the two antagonistic flight muscles in birds?
What is the difference between primary and secondary flight feathers?
What are the main parts of a feather?
When we say asymmetrical wing feathers are associated with flight, what parts are asymmetrical?
Flight is very energetically demanding. What are the benefits of the ability to fly?
What is the ideal wing shape for soaring birds?
While this is good for soaring, what difficulties are associated with the wing shape? (See the "no free lunch question below)
*How do white-muscle and red-muscle fibers differ?
*How does this relate to different types of flight (short sprint vs. long-distance migrants)?
Why do so many birds evolve flightlessness?
Where does this usually happen?
Why did birds "go wild," in an evolutionary sense, on New Zealand?
Name a bird in New Zealand that now fills a typically mammalian niche.
What is an ecological niche?
Name 3 birds in New Zealand that have evolved to fill ecological niches that birds don’t usually occupy.
The Origin of Birds
Define:
Therapod
Thecodont
Who is the "captain" of the 'birds evolved from Dinosaurs school'?
Who leads the 'Birds evolved before the Theropods school'?
How do the hand of birds and dinosaurs differ?
What does Feduccia think about this?
What does Prum say about it?
What is the temporal issue with Archaeopteryx and the Theropod origin of birds?
How do Feduccia and Prum see this?
Archaeoptery lithographica
Give a one-sentence definition of evolution.
How are geological periods defined?
When did A. lithographica live? (how many years ago and in what geological era and period)
What is the chronological sequence of the three eras (Mesozoic, Paleozoic, and Cenozoic?
What is the chronological sequence of the three periods in the Mesozoic?
What era is considered the "age of dinosaurs"
What era is the "age of mammals"
What about A. lithographica was bird-like?
What was reptilian?
From what group of vertebrates did birds evolve?
How do we know birds and reptiles are related?
Why is evolution like tinkering?
How do new traits evolve?
Why are redundancy and gradualism important in the evolution of new traits?
Why does behavior change before structural adaptations evolve?
How does the expression "there’s no such thing as a free lunch" relate to evolution?
Translate this into English:
"...An animal can never be strictly adapted to its present environment. It is always adapted to a sum of past environments in which its ancestors survived. More strictly still, the sum is a weighted sum, with the weights diminishing as we go back in time."
Give an example of this in humans.
Where and when was Archaeopteryx discovered?
Why was the timing important?
What was special about the rocks it was found in?
Compare cursorial and arboreal scenarios for the origin of flight.
What fossil evidence supports these theories?
Could Archaeopteryx lithographica fly?
Definitions:
Adaptive radiation
Aftershaft
Altricial
Cladogram
Crop
Diagnosable
Diagnostic characters
Ecological niche
Extant
Feather vanes
Functional redundancy
Furcula
Galapagos finches
Gizzard
Granivorous
Halux
Hawaiian honeycreepers
heritability
Holarctic
hybrid zone
Keeled sternum
Key adaptation
Monotypic
Oil gland
Parsimony
Passeriformes
Pigeon's milk
Piscivorous
Polyphyletic
Ratite
Remix (plural remiges)
Retrix (plural retrices)
Shared derived characters
Syrinx
2011 STUDENTS CAN IGNORE THESE:
For each of the 14 orders below:
What is our current understanding of the taxonomy of the group? Is it monophyletic? Do we know what the closest allies (other orders) are?
Is it species-rich or does it have only a few families/genera/species?
What types of birds are in this order?
Give the common name of two species in the order.
What are the diagnostic characters of the group?
Ratites—Ostriches, emus, rheas
Podicipediformes – Grebes
Gaviiformes—Loons
Procellariiformes—Albatrosses
Ciconiformes—Herons, etc.
Anseriformes—Ducks, geese and swans
Falconiformes—Diurnal birds of prey
Galliformes—Chicken-like birds
Charadriformes—Shorebirds
Columbiformes—Pigeons and doves
Strigiformes—Owls
Apodiformes—Hummingbirds and swifts
Piciformes—Woodpeckers
Passeriformes—Perching birds
Study Guide: Physiology and Reproduction
Polyandrous
Polygynous
Altricial vs. precocial
Cloaca
Oviparous
Cleidoic egg
Chorion
Allantois
Vitelline Membrane
BMR (basal metabolic rate)
TNZ: Thermo-neutral zone, also upper critical zone, lower critical zone
Explain the heat-loss equation H=(Tb-Ta)/I
What are three things birds can do to manipulate the right side of the equation to reduce heat loss?
What happens when Ta>Tb?
Compare and contrast the counter-current mechanisms associated with the veins in
birds' legs and those in their nasal chambers.
What weight reduction adaptations are associated with the gonads in birds?
True or false: Oocytes in female birds develop after hatching.
Where is lutenizing hormone produced?
What does it control
Where are estrogen and testosterone produced?
True or false: The presence of small quantities of testosterone produce
secondary sexual characteristics in female birds.
What are secondary characteristics?
True or false: Males are the heterogametic sex in birds.
Describe the sequence of events in egg production
What are carotenoid pigments?
Where are they produced in a birds body?
Why are they important physiologically?
Why do birds lay eggs instead of letting the embryos develop internally?
How long does it take to produce an egg?
What happens to BMR when a female is laying eggs?
Why?
True or false: The yolk in birds with precocial young has several times the
energy stores as birds with altricial young.
What are the physiological consequences of having cleidoic eggs?
How do reptile eggs differ from bird eggs?
What's the white stuff in bird droppings?
Why are there pores in bird eggshells?
What is the exquisite compromise associated with these pores?
How did DDT affect reproduction in many species of predatory birds?
What types of birds were most severely affected?
Nares
Syrinx
Air sacs
Pectoralis Major
Supracoracoideus
Rete, or countercurrent mechanism
Give two examples of countercurrent mechanisms in birds.
What is conserved in each?
What are the costs and benefits of the high body temperature of birds?
How do bird lungs differ from mammalian lungs?
What advantage does this confer?
Why is a 4-chambered heart more efficient than a 3-chambered one?
True or false: Most of the oxygenated blood coming from a birds heart goes to
the large pectoralis major muscle, rather than the legs.
Why does so much blood go to the legs?
How do birds get water, besides drinking?
Why do birds need salt glands?
Why are they energetically expensive?
Why don't all birds have them?
Study Guide: Annual
Cycles, Migration & Navigation
Definitions:
Circadian rhythm
Circannual rhythm
Photorefractory period
The external coincidence model (see Gill)
Compare navigation to orientation.
Zugunruhe
Hyperphagia
What are the 3 major energetic demands on a bird during its annual cycle?
What is the typical sequence of these events?
What external cues influence their onset?
What evidence shows that these cycles are not perfectly timed to a 24-hr cycle?
Why might natural selection have led to an imprecise circadian rhythm?
Why is timing so important in the annual cycle?
How do birds and mammals differ in the location of the light receptors that are involved in the circadian cycle?
Is the pineal gland the site of light reception in birds?
Is it important?
How do we know this?
Beside light, what other stimuli are important in determining when, and if, the big annual events (molt, migration, and mating) occur?
MIGRATION 2010 Questions (Chapter 10)
Definitions:
Zugunruhe
Orientation
Navigation
Migration
Emlen
funnel
Leapfrog
migration
Nomadic
movement
Hyperphagia
Irruprtions
Do
birds hibernate?
Where do they go in the winter?
Can
we answer this for all species?
How
do we know where they go?
What’s
the difference between migration and nomadic movement?
Give
an example of a species that does each.
How
many species of birds migrate?
Migration
is really a complex of behaviors. Besides the basic urge to migrate, list 4
separate components of migration.
What’s
the main orientation of migration in the New World?
Why?
In
Asia and Europe?
Why?
Besides
typical latitudinal migration, what other movements do birds make on an annual
(or at least periodical) routine?
Do
most birds migrate in pairs? Family groups?
What
birds migrate in pairs or families?
What
about the others, are there differences between ages and sexes in the timing and
destinations for migration?
Give
examples.
Explain
the differences in an evolutionary sense-what are the
selective pressures that explain these differences?
Distinguish
between ultimate and proximate reasons for migrating.
Compare
the costs and benefits of migration.
What
evidence is there that migratory behavior is genetically determined?
What
is the destination and main migratory pathway for east-coast Ospreys?
How
does this differ from Ospreys from the Pacific northwest?
What
is the main fuel for migratory birds? What advantages does this have over
carbohydrates?
Where
is it deposited in a bird’s body?
Spell
Lake Chargoggagoggmanchauggauggagoggchaubungungamaugg (Just kidding!)
Do
birds undergo other physiological changes in preparation for migration besides
laying down fat? Give an example.
Why
are migratory stopover areas important for conservation?
What
types of habitat are important stopover sites for Neotropical migrants?
For
Chardriformes?
What
types of birds migrate at night? In the daytime? Why?
What
can we learn about migration from weather radar?
Explain
migratory connectivity.
Why
is this important for conservation?
Besides
bird bands, how can we demonstrate this connectivity?
Why
can’t we just rely on bird-band returns to study this connectivity?
Why
do male birds want to get back to their breeding territories in the spring?
What
are the risks?
What
are “Neotropical migrants”?
What arguments can be made for their actually being tropical birds that migrate north to take advantage of seasonally abundant resources?
What
are these resources?
Why
are they suddenly available in the spring?
Why
haven’t tropical forest birds from Africa evolved this behavior to migrate
north to breed in Europe and western Asia?
Study Guide: Conservation
Define:
Metapopulation
Population source/population sink
Biodiversity
Flagship species
Population bottleneck
Habitat corridor
Habitat fragmentation
Neotropical migrant
Shade-grown coffee
xenobiotics
Who was Aldo Leopold?
What perspective did he bring to biological conservation?
Why are we concerned about the loss of rainforests, given that they only
represent 7% of the planets land mass and are NOT a net source of oxygen?
What 15gm bird is holding up residential development around Los Angeles? Why?
What is the Safe Harbor program?
What species would be more affected by pesticides, a Red-tailed Hawk or a Bald
Eagle? Why?
Name two endangered bird species that nest in the old-growth forests of the
Pacific northwest.
What is habitat fragmentation?
Why is it bad for ecosystems? Give at least 2 reasons.
How does hybridization prove problematic in avian
conservation?
Give an example.
When would intervention be ethically appropriate?
Why are conservation biologists so concerned about population size?
How do the 25 pairs of Red-tailed Hawks on the Socorro Islands off Mexico's coast
survive if small population sizes are so all-fired important?
List 5 characteristics that are associated with species of special conservation
concern.
Does a large population guarantee that a species wont go extinct? Cite 2
examples.
Why did only 4 species out of 160 breeding in the forests of eastern North
America go extinct when the forests were almost completely cleared in the last 2
centuries?
What are the major, human-induced sources of bird mortality?
What can be done to reduce their negative affects on bird populations?
List 4 species of birds that have gone extinct in North America in the last 200
years.
What species have shown significant increases as a result of conservation
efforts?
Why has the Thick-billed Parrot been so difficult to reintroduce?
What social conditions are necessary for successful conservation of our natural
resources?
In the map on the left, you can see that the birds from the southern Great Lakes subpopulation all migrate to Central America, while the map on the right shows birds from this same population going to the Caribbean and Central America--so there is connectivity in the map on the left, but not in the map on the right.
Habitat quality and migration in American Redstarts:
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