I get most of my ideas by watching animals and simply asking ‘I wonder why they’re doing that?’ The key to research is coming up with a good question and devising an experiment to answer it.
- Nick Davies
His work shines light on the evolutionary games played out in nature as species compete with environmental pressures, with other species, and with the opposite sex, to pass on their genes.
Reed warblers are a little smaller than sparrows and each one weighs no more than a large envelope. As autumn begins they migrate some 5,000 km from Britain to West Africa, a journey they might make just two or three times in their short lives. In April they fly north to breed in the watery landscapes of northern Europe where they raise their young in nests suspended from reeds. Sometimes they are tricked into raising cuckoo chicks which grow to four times their size.
In his book Cuckoo - Cheating by Nature, Nick Davies (University of Cambridge Department of Zoology) describes what it’s like to watch reed warblers at the Cambridgeshire nature reserve of Wicken Fen. He carefully parts the reeds until he can see a pair of warblers feeding their young in a nest. He senses the parents’ urgency in collecting insects for their chicks while keeping them warm and staying alert for signs of danger. When several hours later he stands up, the intimate world of the warbler disappears into the great expanse of fenland and the wide East Anglian skies.
Observation remains vital to learning more about the world, believes Davies. “There’s still plenty more to learn from going out into nature and watching carefully,” he says. “I get most of my ideas by watching animals and simply asking ‘I wonder why they’re doing that?’ The key to research is coming up with a good question and devising an experiment to answer it.”
Davies, who gives this week's Darwin Lecture (Games Animals Play), has been studying reed warblers at Wicken Fen for more than 30 years.
The lecture Games Animals Play will take place in the Lady Mitchell Hall, Sidgwick Site, University of Cambridge, this Friday, February 26, 2016 - 17:30 to 18:30. No booking required, no charge. Arrive in good time to secure a seat.
Image: a reed warbler feeds a cuckoo fledgling
Credit: Richard Nicoll
Reproduced courtesy of the University of Cambridge
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