Social play has been described in many animals. However, much of this social behaviour
among birds, particularly in adults, is still relatively unexplored in terms of the environmental …

'Mimicry'is used in the evolutionary and ecological literature to describe diverse phenomena.
Many are textbook examples of natural selection's power to produce stunning adaptations …

Throughout their lives animals must complete many tasks, including finding food, avoiding
predators, attracting mates, and navigating through a complex and dynamic environment …

Despite the prevalence of vocal mimicry in animals, few functions for this behaviour have
been shown. I propose a novel hypothesis that false mimicked alarm calls could be used …

Deception is common in nature, but victims of deception discriminate against and ultimately
ignore deceptive signals when they are produced too frequently. Flexible variation of signals …

Learned behavior, a fundamental adaptive trait in fluctuating environments, is shaped by
species-specific constraints. This phenomenon is evident in songbirds, which acquire their …

Mimicry is a canonical example of adaptive signal design. In principle, what constitutes
mimicry is independent of the taxonomic identity of the mimic, the ecological context in which …

“A ground-breaking study of the songs of the pied butcherbird... intellectually engaging and
also very entertaining as a fieldwork memoir.”—The Music Trust How and when does music …

Natural selection is known to produce convergent phenotypes through mimicry or ecological
adaptation. It has also been proposed that social selection—ie, selection exerted by social …

Animals in natural communities gain information from members of other species facing
similar ecological challenges [1–5], including many vertebrates that recognize the alarm …