RESEARCH ACTIVITY
I am broadly interested in the evolution of sociality. Social systems are the products of behavioral strategies of individuals. I study how conflicts of interest arising from group-living are resolved through the evolution of alternative behavioral strategies. My studies have focused on parent-offspring conflict, social parasitism, and reproductive conflicts arising from sociality. I am particularly interested in how ecological, social and genetic factors interact in shaping the evolution of parasitic and cooperative breeding strategies.
Measuring kinship is fundamental to understanding conflicts of interest. My research integrates field observation and experimental work on populations of marked individuals with molecular genetic determination of relatedness. My study animals have varied, but I have worked mainly with birds. Molecular techniques have allowed me to investigate aspects of genetic parentage, complex social group structure and sex ratio manipulation that were intractable from field observations alone.
In one ongoing project, I am studying how ecological factors affect the evolution of conspecific brood parasitism and communal nesting in the common moorhen Gallinula chloropus. This features comparisons among populations of this species and a few other species of rail (Family: Rallidae), and has occupied me on and off over the last ten years. Host responses to brood parasitism are expected to vary in relation to the risk of parasitism in the population and the cost of parasitism to the host. One principal question is: Among populations with varying rates of conspecific brood parasitism, are host responses predictable from ecological, genetic and social factors?
I have also recently been investigating reproductive conflicts in cooperatively breeding African weavers, particularly the white-browed sparrow weaver Plocepasser mahali, in Namibia. Two main questions that form the basis for this research are: 1. To what extent do genetic group structure and dispersal patterns affect the partitioning of reproduction observed in cooperative societies? and 2. Does incest avoidance explain the partitioning of parentage within cooperative breeding groups?
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SELECTED PUBLICATIONS
Jamieson, I.G., McRae, S.B., Trewby, M. and Simmons, R.E. 2000. High rates of conspecific brood parasitism and egg rejection in coots and moorhens in ephemeral wetlands in Namibia Auk 117: 250-252.
McRae, S. B. and Amos, W. A. 1999. Can incest within cooperative breeding groups be detected using DNA fingerprinting? Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology 47:104-107.
McRae, S.B. and Amos, W. 1999. Characterization of hypervariable microsatellites in the cooperatively-breeding white-browed sparrow weaver Plocepasser mahali. Molecular Ecology 8:903-904.
Noble, D. G., Davies, N. B., Hartley, I. R. and McRae, S. B. 1999. The red gape of the nestling cuckoo Cuculus canorus is not a supernormal stimulus for three common hosts. Behaviour 136:759-777.
McRae, S.B. 1998. Relative reproductive success of female moorhens using conditional strategies of brood parasitism and parental care. Behavioral Ecology 9:93-100.
McRae, S.B. 1997. A rise in nest predation enhances the frequency of intraspecific brood parasitism in a moorhen population. Journal of Animal Ecology 66:143-153.
McRae, S.B. 1996. Family values: costs and benefits of communal breeding in the moorhen. Animal Behaviour 52:225-245.
McRae, S.B. 1996. Brood parasitism in the moorhen: brief encounters between parasites and hosts and the significance of an evening laying hour. Journal of Avian Biology 27:311-320.
McRae, S.B. and Burke, T. 1996. Intraspecific brood parasitism in the moorhen: parentage and parasite-host relationships determined by DNA fingerprinting. Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology 38:115-129.
McRae, S.B. 1995. Temporal variation in responses to intraspecific brood parasitism in the moorhen. Animal Behaviour 49:1073-1088.
McRae, S.B., Weatherhead, P.J. and Montgomerie, R. 1993. American robin nestlings compete by jockeying for position. Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology 33:101-106.
Weatherhead, P.J. and McRae, S.B. 1990. Brood care in American robins: implications for mixed reproductive strategies by females. Animal Behaviour 39:1179-1188.
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COURSES TAUGHT
BIOL 5070 Ornithology
BIOL 5071 Ornithology Lab
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PROFESSIONAL MEMBERSHIPS
American Ornithologists' Union
Association for the Study of Animal Behaviour
International Society for Behavioral Ecology
Graduate Women in Science
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HONORS
1999-2000 Smithsonian Institution Postdoctoral Fellowship, Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute , Panama
1995-98 Drapers' Research Fellowship, Pembroke College, University of Cambridge, UK
1995-96 Phyllis and Eileen Gibbs Traveling Research Fellow, Newnham College, University of Cambridge, UK
1992-93 Imperial Order Daughters of the Empire Scholarship (Canada), University of Cambridge, UK
1991-92 Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) Postgraduate Scholarship, University of Cambridge, UK
1991-94 Overseas Research Student Award, University of Cambridge, UK
1991-94 Cambridge Commonwealth Trust Scholar
1988-90 NSERC Postgraduate Scholarship, University of Waterloo, Canada
1988 Carleton University Senate Medal for Outstanding Achievement
1987 & 1988 NSERC Undergraduate Research Student Awards for summer research
1986-87 Hyman Soloway Scholarship, Carleton University, Canada
1986-87 H.H.J. Nesbitt Scholarship in Biology, Carleton University, Canada
1985-86 Betty Nesbitt Memorial Award in Biology, Carleton University, Canada
1985-86 Francis C.C. Lynch Scholarship, Carleton University, Canada
1984-85 General In-course Scholarship, Carleton University, Canada
I have been teaching in the Department of Biology at ECU since January 2000. |
