Charles Walcott
Professor Emeritus, Neurobiology and Behavior
with Charles Walcott
Charles Walcott came to Cornell in 1981 as professor of neurobiology and behavior and as director of the Laboratory of Ornithology. In 1992 he was named the first Louis Agassiz Fuertes Director of the Lab. He left this position in 1995 to resume teaching and research and was later appointed the director of the Division of Biological Sciences (January 1998-June 1999) and the chair of the Department of Neurobiology and Behavior (1999-2001). Walcott served as associate dean and secretary of the University Faculty for three years prior to being elected dean of the University Faculty in 2003. He views the faculty as the core of the university; he believes that strong and effective faculty governance is essential for Cornell's future and that the faculty and the administration must work together to determine academic priorities for Cornell and to ensure adequate financial support.
References
- The Common Loon: Spirit of the Northern Lakes. Judith McIntyre, University of Minnesota Press, 1988 (out of print but available used from Amazon.com)
- Call of the Loon. David Evers and Kate Taylor, Willow Creek Press, 2006
Common loons are large, fish-eating birds that winter on the ocean but breed on freshwater lakes. Loons have been studied for years, but it is only in the last fifteen years that we have a large enough population of banded individuals to begin to understand the details of their behavior. Breeding territories can be founded on vacant lakes by replacing a missing pair member or by actively evicting a member of the pair. When an intruding female takes over a territory, the displaced female moves to an adjacent lake. In contrast, when the intruder is male, about 30 percent of the territorial battles are fatal. If a loon is killed, it is always the resident male, never the intruder. We don't know why there is this asymmetry in the behavior of the two sexes. But since it is the male loon that seems to select the nest site with improving reproductive success every year, this may be the reason.
Many of us know loons by their haunting vocalizations. There are three long distance calls: the wail, the tremolo, and the yodel. Each plays a role in the establishment and maintenance of the breeding territory.
Loons are at the top of the food chain and tend to accumulate toxins, like methyl mercury, in their tissues. One reason for studying loons is to see whether an increase in mercury has any effect on their reproduction or behavior. These CyberTower videos describe how this research is conducted.