Meeting Abstract
With changing seasons comes new abiotic and biotic factors that affect bird behavioral and physiological profiles. Identifying relationships between neophobia and stress in different species of birds through the seasons, and through introduced stimuli, can indicate the variation of stress levels under these conditions. By displaying stimuli to an individual bird during a feeding event at a PASSER smart feeder, we can observe how behavioral responses are altered throughout the changing seasons. We hypothesize that birds’ responses to these induced neophobic stimuli will vary in relation to both seasonal and variable weather conditions. This study uses a computer-enabled automated feeding device equipped with a monitor that displays a variety of images when birds approach the feeder. Images include a variety of stimuli, including common predators, conspecifics, heterospecifics, and novel stimuli. Though these presentations of stimuli induced varying levels of neophobic responses, responses were still correlated to the abiotic and biotic conditions at the time of display. We monitor behavioral responses via recorded video collected by the feeders. To determine the level of response under all presented stimuli, we measure the length of feeding event, noises produced by the bird, and signs of defense before flight. This data shows how birds’ behaviors are alerted and if abiotic and biotic factors matter. In this poster, we will describe our methods and results, and discuss implications of our findings and techniques for future studies.
