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Full-Text Articles in Biology
Fecal-Sac Ingestion By Spotted Towhees, Jenny E. Mckay, Michael T. Murphy, Sarah Bartos Smith, Jennifer K. Richardson
Fecal-Sac Ingestion By Spotted Towhees, Jenny E. Mckay, Michael T. Murphy, Sarah Bartos Smith, Jennifer K. Richardson
Biology Faculty Publications and Presentations
Altricial nestlings encase excrement in fecal sacs that parents remove by either ingesting them or transporting them away from the nest. Ingestion may allow energetically or nutritionally deprived parents to recapture energy or nutrients that might be lost because of nestlings' inefficient digestion (the "parental-nutrition hypothesis"), but ingestion may also permit parents to avoid flights from the nest that interfere with parental care (e.g., brooding young; the "economic-disposal hypothesis"). We used a hypothetico-deductive approach to test the two hypotheses' ability to account for fecal-sac ingestion by the Spotted Towhee (Pipilo maculatus). We confirmed the parental-nutrition hypothesis' predictions that …
Seal Bounties In Maine And Massachusetts, 1888 To 1962, Barbarai Lelli, David Harris Ph.D, Aboueissa Abouel-Makarim
Seal Bounties In Maine And Massachusetts, 1888 To 1962, Barbarai Lelli, David Harris Ph.D, Aboueissa Abouel-Makarim
Faculty Publications
Maine and Massachusetts paid bounties on seals during the 19th and 20th centuries. To determine the number of seals killed for bounty, we examined historical records of bounty claims, and used geographic information systems and multiple linear regression to find predictors of places where large numbers of bounties were paid. We found records of 24,831 bounties paid in Maine (1891-1945) and 15,690 in Massachusetts (1888-1962), Considering possible fraud, missing data, and seals struck and lost, this suggests that 72,284 to 135,498 seals were killed in the bounty hunt, probably enough to account for regional declines in seal populations. Larger numbers …