With 68% of the world's population expected to live in cities by 2050, it is crucial to
understand how animals respond to urbanization. Urban areas are associated with changes …

Due to resource limitations and physical constraints of the reproducing female, a trade‐off
must be made between the number of eggs she produces and their size per clutch. This …

The environment that animals experience during development shapes phenotypic
expression. In birds, two important aspects of the early‐developmental environment are lay …

In avian species, the number of chicks in the nest and subsequent sibling competition for
food are major components of the offspring's early-life environment. A large brood size is …

Across taxa, the temperature experienced by individuals early in life can have large effects
on their development. However, comparatively little is known about whether the effects of …

Despite avid interest in life history trade-offs and the costs of reproduction, evidence that
increased parental allocation reduces subsequent breeding productivity is mixed. This …

Mortality rates are high for most avian species during early life stages, forming a critical
source of natural selection that helps shape the diversity of avian life-history traits. We …

Avian eggs develop outside of the female body, and therefore embryonic development is
subject to multiple internal (physiological) and external (ecological) factors. Embryonic …

A historic debate in biology is the question of nature vs. nurture. Although it is now known
that most traits are a product of both heredity (“nature”) and the environment (“nurture”) …

Weather conditions play a pivotal role in embryo development and parental incubation
costs, potentially impacting the clutch size and incubation behavior of birds. Understanding …