RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Colour Preferences of UK Garden Birds at Supplementary Seed Feeders
JF bioRxiv
FD Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
SP 103671
DO 10.1101/103671
A1 Luke Rothery
A1 Graham W. Scott
A1 Lesley J. Morrell
YR 2017
UL http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2017/01/27/103671.abstract
AB Supplementary feeding of garden birds has benefits for both bird populations and human wellbeing. Birds have excellent colour vision, and show preferences for food items of particular colours, but research into colour preferences associated with artificial feeders is limited to hummingbirds. Here, we investigated the colour preferences of common UK garden birds foraging at seed-dispensing artificial feeders containing identical food. We presented birds simultaneously with an array of eight differently coloured feeders, and recorded the number of visits made to each colour over 370 30-minute observation periods in the winter of 2014/15. In addition, we surveyed visitors to a garden centre and science festival to determine the colour preferences of likely purchasers of seed feeders. Our results suggest that silver and green feeders were visited by higher numbers of individuals of several common garden bird species, while red and yellow feeders received fewer visits. In contrast, people preferred red, yellow, blue and green feeders.