The Badgers of Wytham Woods: A Model for Behaviour, Ecology, and Evolution

Description

The badgers of Wytham Woods (Oxford, UK) have been studied continuously and intensively by David Macdonald for almost 50 years (25 of them with his former student and co-author Chris Newman), generating a wealth of data pertaining to every facet of their ecology and evolution. Through a mix ofaccessible, highly readable prose and cutting-edge science, the authors weave a riveting scientific story of the lives of these intriguing creatures, highlighting the insights offered to science more broadly through badgers as a model system. They provide a paradigm - from population down tomolecule - for a deeper understanding of mammalian behaviour, ecology, epidemiology, evolutionary biology, and conservation. The real value of this long-term study is particularly apparent with current and globally relevant challenges such as climate change, disease epidemics, and senescence. Thisunique dataset enables us to examine these issues in a context that only a half-century experiment can reveal.The Badgers of Wytham Woods will appeal to a broad audience of professional academics (especially carnivore and mammalian biologists), researchers and students at all levels, governmental and non-governmental wildlife bodies, and to the natural historian fascinated by wild animals and the remarkableprocesses of nature they exemplify. Cover Title Page Copyright Page Dedication Page Preface Contents Prologue Maps of Wytham Badger Setts Foreword 1 Setting the Scene: Births and Beginnings 2 It's Tough at the Bottom 3 Apprenticeships for Badger Society 4 Setts, Society, and Super-groups: The Geology of Social Behaviour 5 The Sum of the Parts: knowing One's Place in Badger Society 6 Social Odours: The Perfume of Society 7 Sex: How and Why, and with Whom? 8 Social Behaviour in an Uncooperative Society 9 Who Goes There: Friend or Foe? 10 The Ecological Foundations to Badger Group Living 11 The Economics of Survival: Population Size, and Crashing Through the Ceiling 12 Weather: Actuarial Insights 13 Weather: Badgers Adapt or Die 14 The Game of Life 15 In Sickness and in Health 16 The Story of Badgers and TB: Perturbation and Beyond 17 Genetic Mate Choice—Quality Matters 18 Senescence, Telomeres, and Life history Trade-offs 19 Of the Same Stripe, or Not—Exceptions That Prove Rules References Index