I am a stable isotope scientist and ecologist. Broadly, I am interested in how we can use stable isotopes and lipid biomarkers as proxies for tracing nutrient flow, trophic dynamics, and habitat partitioning of organisms in modern and ancient terrestrial, freshwater, and marine ecosystems. Stable isotopes are an amazing ecological tool. “You are what (and where) you eat!”, meaning the isotopic signatures of the food and water you consume become incorporated into your bodily tissues. Measuring these chemical signatures allows us to “see” behaviour and processes that happen away from the human ..read more

Simmons, P.J. (2024). Scaling of sense organs that control flight: Size and sensory cell number of dipteran fly halteres. Journal of Zoology, vol. 322, pp. 12-23. https://doi.org/10.1111/jzo.13117 Dipteran (‘true’) flies are amongst the most aerobatic insects, and one of the largest insect orders. They are characterised by a single pair of power-providing wings, the hind wings being modified into drumstick-like sensory structures, the  halteres. Halteres act as gyroscopes (as shown by JWS Pringle (1948) in a paper that is a real tour-de-force) providing information that is important ..read more

Prof. Kevin J. Gaston, Environment & Sustainability Institute, University of Exeter, Penryn, Cornwall, UK Abstract People have unique sets of direct sensory interactions with wild species, which change through their days, weeks, seasons, and lifetimes. Despite having important influences on their health and well-being and their attitudes towards nature, these personalized ecologies remain surprisingly little studied and are poorly understood. However, much can be inferred about personalized ecologies by considering them from first principles (largely macroecological), alongside insights f ..read more

Cooper, C.E., Erbe, C., Withers, P.C., Barker, J.M., Ball, N. and Todd-Jones, L. (2023). Sound production by the short-beaked echidna (Tachyglossus aculeatus). Journal of Zoology, vol. 321, pp. 302-308. https://doi.org/10.1111/jzo.13114 Authors of this study Christine Cooper and Justine Barker were radio-tracking one of the wild short-beaked echidnas involved in Justine’s PhD research to change the battery on his on-board GPS unit. They found him in a mating train with seven other echidnas, and much to their surprise, as they approached him they heard dove-like cooing sounds which he cont ..read more

This March we celebrate frogs for World Frog Day (March 20th). The diversity of frogs has fascinated zoologists from the very earliest issues of Transactions and Proceedings of the Zoological Society of London, with many anatomical descriptions from the early 1800s. The more unusual traits of frogs have provided fruitful areas of research, including reproductive traits. Boulenger (1895) described parental care in both Goeldi’s frog Hyla goeldii (now Fritziana goeldi) and the golden poison arrow frog (Phyllobates terribilis), in which both species carry their post-hatch offspring on their backs ..read more

Waitangi Day (Te Rā o Waitangi) is the national day of New Zealand marking the anniversary of the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi, an agreement between the British Crown and Māori chiefs, on 6 February, 1840. For our February ‘Species in the Spotlight’ virtual issue, we are therefore celebrating New Zealand’s land animals. Only twelve years after the signing of the Treaty, Mantell (1852) published a description and the first illustration of the takahē, which had been thought to be extinct.  The description showed that takahē had survived, but subsequent sightings were unverified, and th ..read more

Makuya, L. and Schradin, C. (2024). Costs and benefits of solitary living in mammals. Journal of Zoology, https://doi.org/10.1111/jzo.13145 In a world full of hectic, stress and conflict, many of us dream of a simpler life: Being alone in a mountain hut, in the desert, out in nature, far away from the crazy crowds. But would living solitary really solve our problems, would it be an easy life? Or would it lead to other problems, other difficulties we don’t even think about? For decades, field biologists have been going to exotic places to study why animals live in groups. Jane Goodall pion ..read more

Warburton, N.M., Withers, P.C. and Martin, M. (2024). More than one way to eat a mouse: Skull shape variation within a monophyletic group of mammals (Marsupialia; Dasyurinae). Journal of Zoology, vol. 322, pp. 76-88. https://doi.org/10.1111/jzo.13124 In a perfect research world, once you have developed a research question, fleshed out your literature review, decided on your methods and collected your data it should then be a relatively simple and straight-forward path to publishing your scientific story. Right?? Well… … as we all know, the world is not perfect and for very many of us, the ..read more

Veon, J.T., Lassiter, E.V., Johansson, E., Shaw, M., McTigue, L., Massey, A., Gibson, R. and DeGregorio, B.A. (2023). Influence of human development and predators on patterns of Virginia opossum occupancy, abundance, and activity. Journal of Zoology, vol. 321, pp. 278-288. https://doi.org/10.1111/jzo.13111 Imagine venturing into the remote wilderness. Most of the wildlife there could eat you if they had the chance. You can optimally forage at night for food, but many of these predators lurk and hunt in the shadows. You are small (approximately 3 kg), slow moving, and your main defense mec ..read more

As we are now in the northern hemisphere winter and the festive season, we throw the spotlight on Reindeer, resident of the North Pole, and a zoological symbol of modern Christmas. Reindeer or caribou (Rangifer tarandus) have featured throughout the long history of the journal, being mentioned in passing in the first volume of Proceedings of the Zoological Society of London (1830, Vol 1: 79–88). Thereafter, several features of their biology have fascinated zoologists. Early work concentrated on descriptions of the different sub-species of reindeer, including a description o ..read more