Recently it has been discovered that Black Larks, living on the Eurasian steppes in Kazakhstan, transport dung to their nests to build large 'pavements' . Weird and almost dirty behaviour, but what is the use of it? This spring a team of researchers from the Universities of Wageningen and Münster and the Association for the Conservation of Biodiversity in Kazakhstan (ACBK) will try to answer this question, doing fieldwork in the Korgalzhyn area in Kazakhstan. On this blog we will post on our findings and adventures.

Monday 26 October 2015

Our project featured in the BOU blog

Last time we wrote that we are working on a summary of our recent paper in The Auk on the use of dung in Black Lark nests. We did write this summary, and we are proud to announce that it is now featured in the famous ornithological BOU blog!

You can read the blog here

And the attached paper:
Functions of extensive animal dung “pavements” around the nests of the Black Lark (Melanocorypha yeltoniensis). Fijen, T.P.M., Kamp, J., Lameris, T.K., Pulikova, G., Urazaliev, R., Kleijn, D., & Donald, P.F. 2015. The Auk 132(4): 878-892. DOI: 10.1642/AUK-15-38.1

Thursday 10 September 2015

Dung use in nests of Black Larks

It has been an incredible while since we have posted something on this blog. Not because we are not working on it anymore, in the contrary, we have been quite busy. Yesterday, the first paper of this study has been published in The Auk: Ornithological Advances!

So, what is the answer on the question ' Why do Black Larks use dung at their nests"? Find out here http://www.bioone.org/doi/abs/10.1642/AUK-15-38.1.

We will be out more soon on why, and why it is so interesting!