Scientific conferences are a key component of academic communication and development. During the COVID-19 pandemic in-person conferences are rapidly moving online, yet these virtual events may not provide the same opportunities as in-person conferences. If virtual meetings are to continue to provide effective communication and networking between researchers and stakeholders, they must be adapted to increase delegate engagement and enthusiasm. Here we present a case study of a recent medium-sized online conference. We assessed the...

Cichlid fish of the genus Oreochromis form the basis of the global tilapia aquaculture and fisheries industries. Broodstocks for aquaculture are often collected from wild populations, which in Africa may be from locations containing multiple Oreochromis species. However, many species are difficult to distinguish morphologically, hampering efforts to maintain good quality farmed strains. Additionally, non-native farmed tilapia populations are known to be widely distributed across Africa and to hybridize with native Oreochromis species, which themselves...

Mechanistic models suggest that information acquired by animals (“knowledge”) could shape home range patterns and dynamics, and how neighbours share space. In social species this would suggest that immigrants could bring new knowledge into social groups, potentially affecting the dynamics of home range overlap. We tested this “immigrant knowledge hypothesis” in a wild population of chacma baboons (Papio ursinus). We used data collected between 2005 and 2013 on two neighbouring troops in Namibia, comprising GPS...

The extent to which prey traits combine to influence the abundance of predators is still poorly understood, particularly for mixed predators in sympatry and in aquatic ecosystems. In this study, we characterise prey use and distribution in iconic bird (grey wagtails and Eurasian dippers) and fish species (brown trout and Atlantic salmon) to assess whether prey traits could predict populations of these four riverine predators. Specifically, we hypothesised that: (i) Prey key traits would predict...

1. Regional endothermy has evolved several times in marine fishes, and two competing hypotheses are generally proposed to explain the evolutionary drivers behind this trait: thermal niche expansion and elevated cruising speeds. Evidence to support either hypothesis is equivocal, and the ecological advantages conferred by endothermy in fishes remain debated. 2. By compiling published biologging data and collecting precise speed measurements from free-swimming fishes in the wild, we directly test whether endothermic fishes encounter broader...