Are grackles on the edge more flexible? Edge grackles have higher variance in flexibility (but not higher avg) & are more persistent than non-edge grackles (no diff in exploration/innovativeness). Also, this species shifted toward living more in urban, arid environments. Articles were #PeerReviewed @PeerCommunityIn Ecology, published
@PeerCommunityJournal #TheGrackleProject
Press release https://www.mpg.de/20729532/0809-evan-a-bird-species-rapidly-expand-its-range-150495-x
Article (edge) https://doi.org/10.24072/pcjournal.320
Article (habitat) https://dx.doi.org/10.24072/pcjournal.248
Behavior is the secret to success for a range expansion

Researchers find that behavioral flexibility and persistence help species, like the great-tailed grackle, expand their range and adapt to new habitats

THANK YOU to all authors for your contributions - this was a huge project! Kelsey McCune, @DieterLukas, Christa LeGrande-Rolls, Zara Marfori, Josie Hubbard, Nancy Chen, and Jeremy Summers at Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, UCSB, UC Davis, and University of Rochester
A HUGE thank you to our wonderful @PeerCommunityIn Ecology recommender Esther Sebastián González and reviewers: Caroline Marie Jeanne Yvonne Nieberding, Pizza Ka Yee Chow, Tim Parker, @fxdm and 2 anonymous reviewers. Your PRE- (https://doi.org/10.24072/pci.ecology.100062) & POST- (https://doi.org/10.24072/pci.ecology.100535) study feedback was amazing and helpful and really improved our research program! Thank you so much for investing your time and energy! #PeerReviewedPreregistration #Preprint
The role of behavior and habitat availability on species geograp...

Why are some species expanding their geographic #range, while others aren’t? See Jeremy Summers’ excellent thread on our findings comparing the rapidly expanding great-tailed grackles with their closest relative, the not rapidly expanding boat-tailed grackles #TheGrackleProject
https://twitter.com/demo_jemo/status/1633883362657202177
Jeremy Summers on X

Newly published paper by myself and @LoganCorina, @DieterLukas, and @popgenchen on the range expansion of the great-tailed grackle, and range stability of the boat-tailed grackle! https://t.co/7QgcOVZKUA #TheGrackleProject @PeerComJournal

X (formerly Twitter)
No support for the hypothesis that higher average flexibility is required in an edge population of a species that is expanding its range. Grackles are a flexible species, but no differences in avg flexibility were associated with their expansion. The edge pop had a higher variance in flexibility, which indicates that there is a larger diversity of flexibility the population. Could lead to a higher chance that at least some individuals in the population could be more flexible. #TheGrackleProject