From dodging collisions to choosing your friends, behaviour provides a means for animals to respond to diverse challenges.

Roslyn Dakin’s group at Carleton University studies the dynamics of behaviour with the goal of understanding how behaviours work and how they have evolved. In this talk, she will look at social behaviour in two systems: first, winter bird communities visiting backyard feeders – what they found may surprise you – and, second, a population of wire-tailed manakins, tropical birds that spend most of their time on the ground, and that, like us, co-operate to attain status.