Parasitic Birds and Their Hosts

This book is the first to present a copmprehensive overview of the diverse kinds of birds and interactions involved in avian brood parasitism. This phenomenon has attracted the interests of naturalists and evolutionists since Darwin, yet very few researchers applied modern evolutionary theory and experimental methods to the study of the adaptations for and against brood parasitism by parasitic birds and their hosts until 25 years ago. The amount of work being done on parasitic birds has grown at an accelerating rate in the last decade as numerous researchers have begun to pursue the study of these birds. This book has papers written by individuals or research groups from all over the world who have been responsible for nearly every major, comprehensive study to appear in the last 10 years.