A new study further feeds humanity’s insatiable hunger for news about the birds called great tits:
“Promiscuity, Paternity and Personality in the Great Tit,” Samantha C. Patrick, Joanne R. Chapman, Hannah L. Dugdale, John L. Quinn and Ben C. Sheldon, Proceedings of the Royal Society B, vol. 279, 2012, pp. 1724-1730. The authors, at the University of Oxford, UK, Centre d’Etudes Biologiques de Chize, Villiers en Bois, France, and the University of Groningen, The Netherlands. explain:
“Understanding causes of variation in promiscuity within populations remain a major challenge…. Our data thus demonstrate a link between personality and promiscuity, with no net effects on reproductive success”
(Thanks to investigator Dany Adams for bringing this to our attention.)