Animal Behavior

Individual Research Projects

Advice on selection of a research project topic:

You have a limited amount of time available for this project, so pick your topic carefully. Part of the reason for requiring a proposal is so that each of you can have my input into the design and execution of your project. It is imperative that you start this project early; many species will be available early in the fall, but few will be around later. It is usually best to work with an animal that is relatively common and conspicuous, so that you can find enough of them to collect data. Birds and insects are probably the best bet for field projects; other vertebrates, such as fish, and invertebrates like crayfish, pillbugs (roly-polys), and spiders are available as well, and some species and behaviors lend themselves to laboratory projects.  Most animals (around here, at least) spend a lot of their time doing something. It is necessary simply to watch them for some time to find out what they are doing, then ask yourself some questions about their behavior. In addition to the equipment listed below, it is possible to construct various types of experimental apparatus, such as habitat preference chambers, pheromone choice chambers, and infrared light observation chambers (for nocturnal observations).

Potential research project topics:

• Foraging behavior of honeybees, bumblebees, or butterflies
• Foraging behavior and vigilance in fox squirrels
• Foraging success in antlions
• Colony size and fecundity in paper wasps
• Small mammal home range size
• Predator avoidance by grasshoppers
• Habitat selection by cricket frogs
• Habitat selection by pillbugs
• Group foraging in cattle egrets, grackles, red-winged blackbirds, starlings, etc.
• Positive assortative mating in humans
• Fruit fly mating behavior
• Personal space in Brewer's Blackbirds or other flocking birds
• Foraging and social behavior in fire ants or seed-harvester ants
• Habitat selection and spatial distribution of fire ant or seed-harvester ant colonies
• Reproductive behavior of soldier beetles
• Sexual dimorphism in leaf-footed bugs, soldier beetles, field crickets, crayfish, and others
• Prey capture by crayfish
• Foraging and food plant selection in monarch butterflies or swallowtail butterflies
• Foraging behavior of mosquitofish, shiners, or bluegill
• Mating, mate-guarding, and oviposition in damselflies or dragonflies
• body size and fecundity in field crickets, leaf-footed bugs, and others
• Pheromone detection and preference in various insects
• Dominance relations in crayfish
• Colonization of cow pies

Equipment available in the Biology department:

Field sites that are accessible to College personnel:

Bratz Field Laboratory, north of Sadler, TX (west of Sherman on Hwy. 82). The Bratz Lab is about 30 km from Sherman. About 30 ha (75 acres), mostly wooded but with an area of about 8 ha that is more open and grassy with scattered junipers. Some herps and birds, and insects in the open area. Property of AC.

Buckner Nature Preserve, east of Denison, TX. About 15 km from campus. About 47 ha, mostly deciduous woods but with an area of about 8 ha that is open. Also contains a stand of loblolly pine. Some birds and possibly herps in the right place and at the right time. Property of AC.

Sneed Environmental Research Area, about 20 km west of Sherman, off of Hwy 82. About 40 ha, mostly disturbed prairie but with three ponds and a wooded stream bottom. Good for birds and insects. Adjacent to Hagerman NWR (to the west). Property of AC.

Herman Baker Park, in southwest Sherman, off Hwy 56 (Houston/Lamar). This park contains a lake of about 4 ha, which is surrounded by a wooded area as well as more open areas. Good for birds. City of Sherman park. Be careful about the time of day that you visit this site.

Hagerman National Wildlife Refuge, on the Big Mineral Arm of Lake Texoma, north and west of Sherman, about 30 km. This is a preserve of about 4450 ha, which contains a diversity of habitats including mudflats and lakeshore, prairies, and wooded areas. Great for birds, and for insects on flowering plants such as buttonbush. Operated by US Fish and Wildlife Service.

Denison Dam area of Lake Texoma, north of Sherman on Hwy 75 and then Hwy 91, about 30 km. There are several interesting places near the dam. The Red River below the dam usually is home to several bird species, as is Shawnee Creek which enters the Red River from the south about 1 km below the dam.  Shawnee Creek at Ross Perot Crossing (on Hwy 91 south of the dam) is also an interesting area; several species of fish inhabit the stream here. A marsh area north of the Red River and below the dam also contains many bird species, as well as fish and herps. Operated by US Army Corps of Engineers.

The Austin College Campus provides many opportunities for behavioral observations.

If you wish to go farther afield, there are several interesting spots within 1-3 hrs drive of Sherman. The department has a limited amount of camping equipment if you want to go a relatively long distance.

Tishomingo National Wildlife Refuge, on the upper Washita River arm of Lake Texoma, about 100 km from Sherman. This is the "sister" preserve of Hagerman NWR, and includes about 10,000 ha of bottomland hardwood forest, mudflats, and some upland forest areas. Good for birds, especially later in the year when waterfowl arrive. Check in with refuge personnel at the headquarters before wandering off into the refuge. Operated by US Fish and Wildlife Service.

Pennington Creek, near Tishomingo, Johnston Co, OK, about 120 km from Sherman. There are several interesting spots along the downstream part of this clear-water, gravel bottom stream. The Tishomingo Municipal Golf Course provides access to an interesting spot with riffles and pools, where fish and frogs are common, along with a wide variety of aquatic invertebrates. Upstream, there is a Nature Conservancy area that we have access to, with birds as well as aquatic creatures. Be careful where you enter the stream, because some of the redneck landowners are quite territorial. See me for directions to these places.

Wichita Mountains National Wildlife Refuge, north of Lawton, Comanche Co, OK, about 300 km from Sherman. This is a large refuge in the mid-grass prairie of western Oklahoma, with about 9000 ha in the public access area. Good for several bird species that are rare around Sherman. This is also a good place to observe prairie dogs as well as large mammals such as bison and elk. Do not approach bison closely -- they can go from standing still to 45 kph in about three steps. Bison have horns that are a foot long, and curve strongly upward. There are several gorings of ignorant tourists in the refuge each year. Operated by US Fish and Wildlife Service.
 Library resources:

The following are some of the journals in our library that have articles on animal and human behavior.  There may be others that have material of interest to you.
 
 

The following journals contain articles on behavior, but are not in our library. Use the electronic databases in Abell Library to find titles and citations, then either print the full-text articles or use interlibrary loan to get the articles. Be aware that the latter process takes some time. There may be other journals available that I have not listed.

Annals of the Entomological Society of America
Australian Journal of Zoology
Behavioral Ecology
Behaviour
Ecological Entomology
Ethology
Journal of Insect Behavior
Journal of the Kansas Entomological Society
Oecologia
Oikos
Pan-Pacific Entomologist
Psyche
 

Notes on literature searches in Abell Library:

Literature searches in Abell Library are now much easier and more effective, thanks to a new Internet-based system. Go through the AC Home Page Resources link to the Abell Library page, then to "Selected for a virtual library" (under Electronic Resources). From there, go through the "Local Access Only" link to the periodical search system. There you will find links to Britannica Online, FirstSearch, WilsonWeb, and Project Muse. For our purposes, the WilsonWeb will be most useful. From WilsonWeb, go to the Database Selection page. Select "OmniFile Full Text Mega"databases for as many year cohorts as you want to search (by clicking the boxes), then choose either Search (for a simple key-word search) or SearchPlus (for a search with Boolean operators). This will give you a search page, including a search field. You can enter a variety of key words in the search field, tell the system where to search (words anywhere, title, author, subject), then tell the system to search. Your results will be summarized in a search history field below the searching field, and you click on the results to view bibliographic information (and in some cases abstracts and full text) of articles that relate to your subject. This capability extends to any computer that is linked to the college's network, so can be used from any of the computer labs in addition to the machines in the library.