A new paper involving Environment Institute members Rebecca Boulton (an honorary senior research fellow) and Phill Cassey has recently been publihed in the Journal of Avian Biology.

The paper, titled ‘How avian incubation behaviour influences egg surface temperatures: relationships with egg position, development and clutch size’ explains the results of a study of the great tit Parus major, a species with a large clutch size, to investigate surface cooling rates of individual eggs within the nest cup across a range of ambient temperatures in a field situation. The study used state-of-the-art portable infrared imaging and digital photography, testing for associations between egg surface temperature (and rate of cooling) and a combination of egg specific (mass, shape, laying order, position within clutch) and incubation specific (clutch size, ambient temperature, day of incubation) variables.

Download the paper to find out about the results.