Dr Sean Doody
Behavioural & Evolutionary Ecology, Invasion Biology
Phone: 0418599719
E-mail: sean.doody@anu.edu.au
Potential honours projects for 2010:
1. Adaptive significance of communal nesting in skinks (July 2010 start)
Communal nesting is widespread in animals, occurring in insects, mollusks, fish, amphibians, reptiles, and birds to name a few. While some benefits of communal nesting may be pervasive, the remarkable diversity in the life histories of the animals that exhibit this behaviour presents a great challenge to discovering any general explanation. Reptiles offer ideal systems for investigating communal nesting because they generally lack parental care – a simplification that brings nest site choice in sharp focus. The honours project will use laboratory experiments to determine if communal nesting in a small species of Australian skink is due to conspecific cueing (mothers attracted to the eggs of other mothers), and field research near Sydney to test the idea that communal nesting enhances survival. Outcomes will include an understanding of why skinks nest communally.
2. Costs and benefits of explosive hatching in a skink (July 2010 start)
Organisms respond to risk in many ways. If responses are costly or only useful when risks are imminent, organisms can evolve plasticity in those responses. Such ‘inducible defenses’ are commonplace in organisms at risk from predation. Although most research on plastic responses to risk has focused on adults and larvae, recent studies demonstrate that embryos are capable of similar responses. One such response is early hatching, which has recently been discovered in an Australian skink. The honours project will use laboratory and field experiments to confirm explosive hatching, quantify its mechanism, and investigate the costs and benefits of early hatching in a small Australian skink. Findings will help determine the evolutionary significance of explosive hatching in skinks, and thus early hatching in animal embryos.
3. Invasive cane toads in the Kimberley: Cascading effects on reproductive success in birds (February 2010 start)
Severe population declines in native predators due to invasive cane toads can lead to cascading effects down trophic levels. Cane toads are moving rapidly towards the Kimberley where they are predicted to cause marked declines in a few goanna species, and increases in some prey of those goannas (smaller lizards). In turn, recent research indicates that these goannas and smaller lizards are both predators of the eggs of significant bird species. The honours project will quantify egg predation of two bird species by goannas and other lizards in the Kimberley during the wet season, and thus determine the ‘apparently conflicting’ impacts of cane toads on recruitment in those species.
Findings will allow a more comprehensive understanding of the impacts of cane toads on native predators.
4. Invasive cane toads in the Kimberley: Impacts on native animals and local control (July 2010 start)
Invasive cane toads are moving rapidly towards the Kimberley region. Some species of frog-eating predators such as goannas die while attempting to ingest toads, and severe population-level declines have occurred in some of those predator species. The honours project will investigate impacts of cane toads on native reptiles in the Kimberley during the dry season, and will also improve techniques for effective local control of toads (e.g., fencing around waterholes) associated with community groups (Frogwatch, Stop the Toad Foundation). Findings will contribute to our understanding of impacts which will facilitate control measures and other conservation priorities.
