Don’t forget there will be live music and a ceilidh starting from 6:30pm at Zerodegrees (53 Colston St, Bristol BS1 5BA). The last ceilidh we had at #ASABSpring2024 was a true delight, don’t miss out! #ASABSpring2026
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The organisers Sam Ellis Andy Higginson, Lauren Brent & Lisa Leaver on the campus green
A large group of volunteers next to a sculpture with the Exeter uni clock tower in the background
It’s been a wonderful few days at #ASABSpring2024. Please everyone thank the organisers Sam Ellis, Andy Higginson, Lauren Brent & Lisa Leaver for putting on such a great conference, and @CrabExeter for hosting 🦀. Huge thank you as well to the team of volunteers!
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Delphine de moor handing Sam Ellis a chocolate
We had a very successful conference for keeping to time! It turns out if you offer chocolate for finishing under 12 minutes, it really promotes timeliness. Hot tip for you other conference organisers out there 😉 #ASABSpring2024
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Our video of the
#ASABSpring2024 Cèilidh is up on insta and Twitter !
www.instagram.com/reel/C6M2aZS...
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Head over to our Instagram to see the #ASABafterDark photos for #ASABSpring2024 !
www.instagram.com/p/C6M4BW7qI0...
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Raven poster winner with Awani Bapat and the three honourable mention posters
Collage of various researcher looking at posters in the poster session
We had some truly fantastic talks, but let’s not forget all of the hard work put into the posters of #ASABSpring2024. Congrats to poster winner Awani Bapat (@awanib.bsky.social) and honourable mentions Ari Drummond, Katie Crawford & Roxy Holmes!
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Fionnuala McCully standing by a slide with a concrete building reading “greetings from pyramiden! The Arctic’s creepiest soviet ghost town” including a photo of a bust of lenin
Last talk of #ASABSpring2024 by Fionnuala McCully on coordinated parental care, where costs of parental care are more evenly distributed. She looked at how black-legged kittwakes coordinated care in the short- and long-term at “The Arctic’s creepiest soviet ghost town.”
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Daniel Sankey in front of a slide that says “Stable investment in durable public goods in cooperative breeders”
How do cooperative breeders decide whether to invest or exploit the “public good”? It seems that relatives are the most likely to be exploiters, says Daniel Sankey. It makes sense, we all have cousins like that… #ASABSpring2024
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Charli Grimes in front of a slide titled “menopause matters female killer whales protect offspring from harm?” with killer whales pictured on it
Menopause not only occurs in humans, but also several species of whales. And it’s a mystery why it exists! Charli Grimes’ research in killer whales indicates that postreproductive females reduce injury in their male offspring (but not their grand-offspring) #ASABSpring2024
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A slide of a sea lion pup nursing labelled “What is Super Suckling?”
Sea lion offspring engage in “super suckling” when they’re still nursing past typical weaning age. According to Alexandra Childs, this behaviour is not as uncommon as you might think! 🦭
(“Spaghetti” the pup definitely makes this the cutest slide of the last day of #ASABSpring2024)
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Good people at #ASABSpring2024, I am advertising a fully funded PhD studentship on perceptual processing during mate choice in 🐟. More details here: www.exeter.ac.uk/study/fundin...
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Christoph Netz next to a slide in which green and blue blobs grow and shrink
Psychedelic art or a model of the coevolution of predatory-prey movement strategies? This cool work by Christoph Netz shows that as a result of movement strategy evolution there can be rapid changes and alternative stable states #ASABSpring2024
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Naomi Walsh standing by a slide with a yellow square around an elephant that reads “AI enhanced camera monitoring for zoological collections: assessing behaviour and welfare”
Long-term monitoring at zoos can be challenging due to limited time and resources. New AI technology is being trialed by Naomi Walsh to address this problem! Some hiccups (such as mixing up lion tails with ostrich heads), but it looks promising 🤖 #ASABSpring2024
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Joe wilde pointing to a video of a fiddler crab waving to a waving robot crab
Fiddler crabs wave as a sexual signal (hey girl, heeeeyy). Joe Wilde & colleagues made the “Wavey Dave” robot to see if other crabs could flexibly adjust their signalling in response 🦀 #ASABSpring2024
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Thomas standing next to a slide with a picture of himself holding a hornet asking “Why the concern?”
Invasive hornets are a problem as they can cause defenseless honeybee colonies to collapse 💀 According to Thomas O'Shea–Wheller, humans are not great at making correct IDs. With over 99% accuracy, it looks like deep learning might save the day for monitoring 🐝🤖 #ASABSpring2024
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Slide with orca reading “Key Messages - The new policy will: 1. Align expectations across UKRI 2. Align language to other checks (e.g. ARRIVE guidelines) 3. Widen scope to all animals and procedures involving animals 4. Better support the 3Rs 5. Clarify expectations for overseas work 6. Encourage high welfare, openness and a culture of care 7. Support research integrity and research reproducibility Improves protections for animals while better supporting researchers whose work involves animals.”
Keep your eyes open 👀 There’s a new UKRI policy on research and innovation involving animals coming out in the next few weeks! #ASABSpring2024
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Photos of the speakers
The last set of flash talks by Rohan Vishwas Joglekar, Kingsley Hunt, Thomas MacGillavry, Erik Versluijs & Lucia Kotianová 🪳🐦⬛🐄🐐🪶
Again, you can find them at their posters if you have any questions! #ASABSpring2024
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Marina in front of a slide reading “behavioural individuality in the collective behaviour of vertebrates”
As technology improves, so does the ability to model and understand the role of behavioural individuality in collective behaviour. Some really cool work by Marina Papadopoulou (Intrigued? Learn about her results in some upcoming papers soon!) #ASABSpring2024
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Linnett by a slide with a kittiwake showing stable populations in the north and others in the south in decline. There are many study sites on the north Atlantic European coast and islands.
In some areas, black-legged kittiwake populations are stable, but in others they are in decline. Linnet Jessell is looking at how colonies are responding to enviro changes & the effects on behaviour. Each of the points indicate a study site with Seatrack! 🌊 🐦 #ASABSpring2024
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Becky in front of a slide reading “should I stay or should I go? The consequences of information for cooperative partnership” with a guppy photo
It is important to know whether or not your partner will be uncooperative (especially if they’re a co-author!) Becky Padget is modelling how information affects cooperative partnership stability 🐠 🐠 #ASABSpring2024
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Libby standing by an illustration showing a hypothesis with first breeding season in blue tits either being successful or unsuccessful and incorporating more insulation if they were unsuccessful.
Nest design in birds has been assumed to be an innate ability, but they can use their experience to be more flexible than previously thought 🪺 Usually, these studies occur in the lab, but this work is being done in the field by Libby Chapman! #ASABSpring2024
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Tom standing by a slide that says “selection and variation in insect behaviour in the wild” with a logo for wildcrickets and university of Exeter. There are two more photos of rqo individually marked crickets and a canister filming a burrow.
Fantastic #ASABSpring2024 plenary by Tom Tregenza. Incredibly detailed work to study evolution, including meticulously marking every cricket & burrow. The amount of video data collected is mind boggling. His team has found lots of selection on behaviour & fluctuations among years!
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Blue tit searching for a virtual moth while Theo stands by
Flash colouration – does it exist to confuse predators? Theo Brown put this hypothesis to the test. It can be pretty challenging for blue tits - and for us! #ASABSpring2024
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Rebecca in front of a picture of a deer with its tongue sticking out
Persistent burping attracts females and discourages males (in fallow deer 🦌 to be clear!). However males that vocalise more also lose some of their size at a faster rate 🤔
Great presentation to end the day by Rebecca Cummins. See you all at the cèilidh! #ASABSpring2024
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Josh standing in front of a slide labelled “pre 4 weeks” “burrow 4 weeks” and “emerged 4 weeks” with dwarf mongoose pups
Dwarf mongooses are cooperative breeders and Africa’s smallest carnivore. Having pups at the burrow appears to reduce the space a group can use #ASABSpring2024
(Also the winner of the cutest slide of the day definitely goes to Josh Arbon)
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Hemal standing in front of a photo of blackbuck leks seen far from above
It can be very challenging to monitor large aggregations of animals, so Hemal Naik is developing a new methodological approach to tackle this problem by combining drones and AI. 🤖 The most important part is ensuring that the drone doesn’t crash on top of a protected species! #ASABSpring2024
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A photo of Cedric in front of a slide with termites reading “Exploring the evolution of termite immunity across phylogeny, sociality and foraging behaviour”
After analysing 47 (!) genomes, Cedric Aumont and colleagues found that the diversity of a number of termite gene families is better explained by foraging (single-site, multiple-site, central-site nesters) than sociality #ASABSpring2024
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A photo of Daniel in front of a slide that reads “Population density, mistaken identity, and interspecific variation in avian same–sex sexual behaviour”
Same sex behaviour in animals can take many forms, such as pair bonds, mounting, and courtship behaviour. Daniel Villar says that it is not even clear if male-male and female-female same sex behaviours are even the same phenomenon! #ASABSpring2024
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Chloe in front of a slide with the steps of analyzing the foam proteome, 1. Sample, 2. Protein extraction, 3. Peptide digestion 4. Separation mass spec. 5. Search 6. Analysis
The #ASABSpring2024 fun fact of the day comes from Chloe Mason: apparently quail sperm ejaculation makes … a whipped foam?!
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Speaking of which, if you have seen a #primate give birth, Isabelle would love to hear from you! 🐒 Survey link: tinyurl.com/mnbexsez
#ASABSpring2024
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