Glasgow Tawny Owl Project

Climate extremes hinder early development in young birds

Climate extremes are on the rise, and early life is extra vulnerable 🌧️

New research led by @devisatarkar.bsky.social reveals that cold snaps and heavy rain can stunt growth and survival prospects in young great tits 👇

Social and ecological factors associated with innovation in urban sulphur-crested cockatoos (Cacatua galerita) Cities are challenging places for wildlife, but some species, like sulfur-crested cockatoos, adapt by finding new ways to feed and solve problems. We studi

New paper alert! 🦜

We gave wild cockatoos puzzle boxes across Canberra’s urban gradient. The finding? Urban birds approach faster, but are not better solvers.

Our results suggest that urbanization shapes neophobia independently from cognitive performance. Read it here:

doi.org/10.1093/behe...

Scotland Outdoors - Tawny Owls, Pearl Mussels and Jelly Ears - BBC Sounds Mark Stephen and Rachel Stewart with stories from the great outdoors

Our research on Tawny Owls at @sbohvm.gla.ac.uk was featured on this episode of BBC Radio Scotland - listen at: www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/...

We discuss how we track Tawnies' movements and the way they are adapting to noisy and light-polluted areas

@dmdominoni.bsky.social
@iapetusdtp.bsky.social

Splat! Could roadkill replace some studies of live animals? Science chats with an ecologist about the advantages of using discarded carcasses for research

#BiologyLetters in @science.org | Roadkill reimagined: a review of innovative scientific use and value of animals killed by vehicular traffic: doi.org/10.1098/rsbl...

The new owl season has already started in Glasgow! We’ve found owls in our boxes – and even chicks! Tawnies breed in deciduous woodlands, but they can also be found in urban parks, and they can start breeding early in the year!

@ecarlonminoia.bsky.social
@dmdominoni.bsky.social

#owls #ecology

Native trees are related to advanced bird breeding phenology and increased reproductive success along an urban gradient Urban areas are altered from natural landscapes in several ways that can impact wildlife. Birds are widespread in urban areas, and it is well documented that there are phenotypic differences between ...

I’m excited to share our new paper in Ecology!
Our 9‑year study across an urban–rural gradient shows native trees, especially oaks, boost blue tit breeding success. More native foliage supports more of the birds preferred prey and improves reproductive success.
📃 doi.org/10.1002/ecy.... #ornithology

Glasgow University study finds birds thrive in native trees Blue tits rear more chicks in oak-rich UK woodlands, says University of Glasgow study, highlighting the importance of native trees for urban…

www.glasgowtimes.co.uk/news/scottis...

Habitat‐Dependent Provisioning Patterns Are Modulated by Weather Conditions in a Rapidly Declining Farmland Raptor We monitored parental food provisioning of Little Owls in four European countries with contrasting farmland structure using nestbox cameras and demonstrated that across all countries, provisioning ra...

A PhD chapter that I'm very proud of is finally out in @ecol-evol.bsky.social!🦉

Using nestbox cameras from 4 countries, we explored interactive effects of habitat quality &weather on provisioning &prey composition 🪱🪲🐀in Little Owls -a rapidly declining farmland raptor.
#RaptorResearch
#Ornithology

Fantastic PhD opportunity available! “Leveraging citizen science data to reveal latent mechanisms regulating bird population dynamics in urbanised landscapes”. Part of the Leverhulme Doctoral Training Program in Ecological Data Science: ecological-data-science.github.io/projects.html. More below.

Toward a unified understanding of people’s aversion to nature: biophobia Human–nature relationships are often framed positively, but research rarely addresses biophobia, the aversion to nature. However, negative relationships with nature are likely to become more widespre...

As researchers, we often frame human-nature relationships as positive, but we have overlooked the opposite: biophobia. In our systematic review, we outline the phenomenon of growing numbers of people feeling fear, aversion or disgust toward nature: doi.org/10.1002/fee....

Light pollution creates multiple threats to the movement ecology of nocturnal arthropod taxa Light pollution is a major contributing factor to declines in global biodiversity1,2 that is steadily increasing in both severity and spatial extent.3…

Our researchers reveal that light pollution disrupts nocturnal insects & spiders' movements.🏙️🕷️

Dr Rochelle Meah & Prof Nicholas Roberts highlight two key effects:

1️⃣ Masked day-to-night transitions. 🌙🕷️
2️⃣ Blinded polarized light for navigation.☀️🦋

Read➡️: www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

🌿 New paper out in npj Urban Sustainability doi.org/10.1038/s429...

🐦 Urban bird diversity is strongly shaped by fine-scale habitat structure. Grass cover, small water bodies and intermediate vegetation complexity enhance biodiversity and ecosystem services, also for future scenarios!

#urbanbirds

The genomics of being an owl The search for candidate genes leads to a surprising hypothesis.

Your daily Avian Hybrids story!

The genomics of being an owl
avianhybrids.wordpress.com/2021/09/01/t...

#ornithology

Young Peregrine euthanised after suffering gunshot injuries in Leicestershire.

Sad news from @leicsperegrines.bsky.social who are working hard to encourage public engagement. Please give them a follow.

#RaptorResearch #WildlifeCrime

raptorpersecutionuk.org/2025/12/24/p...

Great experience attending #BES2025 this week and presenting my poster. Very grateful to see my latest findings featured by @britishecologicalsociety.org. More updates on this work and on our owl project coming in 2026 🦉💡🚗

#owls #ecology #RaptorResearch

A tawny owl with a GPS tracker on its back

To test how noise and light pollution are affecting tawny owls, researchers from the @glasgow.ac.uk fitted GPS trackers with built-in light detectors to 20 owls in both urban and forest landscapes around Glasgow and used remote sound recorders to collect noise data.

Tuve la oportunidad de presentar los primeros resultados de mi PhD sobre modelos para la identificación de aves y los factores que afectan la diversidad aviar en Cali @OrnitologiaCol and also in Edinburgh @britishecologicalsociety.org Stay tune for more information about this research! 🐦‍⬛

Tawny owls are turning to street lighting to help them hunt - BES Tawny owls are turning to street lighting to help them hunt - BES is the largest scientific society for ecologists in Europe. We're working towards a world in which nature and people thrive.

Tawny owls normally rely on sound to hunt, but new research being presented today at #BES2025 finds that owls in Glasgow are adapting to noisy roads by using street lights to hunt.

www.britishecologicalsociety.org/tawny-owls-a...

This one is finally out! We found that local conspecific density does affect vocal individuality in a non-learning species🦉. For more details, check out our new paper 👉
www.nature.com/articles/s41...

#ornithology #bioacoustics #prattle

Looking forward to #BES2025 this week! If you're interested in restoration, complexity and ecoacoustics you should definitely check out my talk on Thursday 🌳🌲🌳🐦🐦‍⬛

If you're at #BES2025 and interested in owls and how noise & light pollution affect their foraging behaviour, come to check out my owl poster 🦉💡🚗

#owls #ecology #ornithology #RaptorResearch

Assembling a new batch of #tawnyowl nestboxes for our project! Looking forward to putting them up and welcoming more owls this coming season 🦉
@e-carlon-m3.bsky.social
#owls #RaptorResearch #ecology

Interested in #RaptorResearch and #MovementEcology? 🧪
The #AnimalEcology Lab at @utu.fi has an open #PhDposition!

We’ll be tagging WTEs with cutting-edge #GPS devices to study their early-life journeys.

Curious to learn more? See the advert: shorturl.at/HMZ84

#PhDOpening #PhDChat #BioLogging

Calling all early-career ornithologists! The abstract submission for EOU Fledglings 2026 is now open! #ornithology

If you work in this area (road safety, lighting specialists, ecologists) then please join our Knowledge Network (information below)

Widespread influence of artificial light at night on ecosystem metabolism - Nature Climate Change The authors combine light intensity data with eddy covariance observations from 86 sites to show that artificial light at night increases ecosystem respiration and alters carbon exchange, with impacts...

Johnston et al (2025) Widespread influence of artificial light at night on ecosystem metabolism 💡🧪🔓

www.nature.com/articles/s41... @natclimate.nature.com

(H/T @zarahpattison.bsky.social)

Interested in mitigating the impacts of light pollution? Join the Knowledge Network! #ALAN

We're leading work on evidence synthesis across biodiversity, road safety and energy impacts and we need your help!

Read more below and join us: www.ncl.ac.uk/nes/our-rese... 💡

Avocetta journal is now also on Bluesky: bsky.app/profile/avoc...

Follow us for news regarding our articles and other ornithological news! 🦜

🚨New paper out
Our study reveals how barn owl parents coordinate nightly chick feeding. Females step up when males underperform & pairs that meet more often at the nest share work more equally boosting chick survival🦉
doi.org/10.1016/j.is...
@unil.bsky.social @vogelwarte.bsky.social #movementecology

Decoding Owl Calls: Refining Occupancy Inference From Passive Acoustic Monitoring | doi.org/10.1002/ece3... | Ecology and Evolution | #ornithology #RaptorResearch 🪶