Eight Ohio Young Birders visited the insect and tetrapods collections at the Museum of Biological Diversity on Saturday (April 9) morning.
Ohio Young Birders with Assoc Prof Jackie Augustine (holding a robot Prairie Chicken) and curator Angelika Nelson
Jackie showed the students a comparison of the innards of a Cooper’s Hawk, Blue-winged Teal, and Mourning Dove, species that use quite different food sources. The students were a captive audience and got really excited when we discovered the remains of a House Sparrow in the stomach of the Cooper’s Hawk.
Crop content (black sunflower seeds) of a Mourning Dove
Angelika presented some displays of bird eggs and specimens which Stephanie Malinich, curatorial manager of the collection, had set up, to the students. Both the extinct species tray and the tray with wood warbler species seen in Ohio were very popular.
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- Passenger Pigeons
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- Angelika Nelson with bird eggs and skull
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- Ohio wood warblers
Luciana fascinated students with stories about insects, how and why they were collected, what we can learn from them, etc. The students asked many interesting questions. They were particularly curious about the meaning of the term ‘biodiversity’, about invasive species, and about the impact of climate change on insects.
About the author: Angelika Nelson is curator of the Borror Laboratory of Bioacoustics and co-organized this visit with Darlene Sillick.