Cowbirds: Villainous Mobsters or Misunderstood?

Dr. S.K. Winnicki walks through the biology of Brown-headed Cowbirds, paying close attention to the ways they interact with their host species and the current state of cowbird biology research. Cowbirds are an Ohio bird species notorious for their breeding system called "brood parasitism" - they lay their eggs in the nests of hundreds of other bird species, forcing those birds to feed their ravenous young. They've been painted as dastardly villains, but what are they really? Dr. Winnicki is a postdoctoral researcher and instructor at The Ohio State University, studying the historical birds of Ohio as part of the Ohio Bird Atlas team. Prior to this role, S.K. Studied baby bird growth during Master's research (Kansas State University) and doctoral research (University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign), and the effect of cowbirds on grassland sparrows during undergraduate work (Denison University). When not researching birds, S.K. Is out photographing birds or talking about them on social media; for more information see S.K.'s website at www.skwinnicki.com .