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Evolution-In-Action: The Campus Juncos at UC San Diego

15 minutes 54 seconds

Now Playing As: Captioned (English) (change)

In contrast to the peaceful wildlands featured in the prior segments, the urban campus of the University of California-San Diego (UCSD) seems like an unlikely place to find field biologists studying juncos. But in the early 1980s, some juncos decided to make this atypical urban and coastal habitat their year-round home. Since then, scientists have documented a remarkable array of changes in the physical traits, behaviors, and physiology of the colonist population of juncos at UCSD when compared to juncos from the nearby native range. Part of Ordinary Extraordinary Junco (Chapter 6).

Media Details

Runtime: 15 minutes 54 seconds

Man in suit and bowtie with a blackboard behind him. Blackboard shows two sets of birds in cages, one with lights, one without. Caption: This pioneering experiment would make Rowan famous.
Ordinary Extraordinary Junco
Episode 2
4 minutes 54 seconds
Grade Level: 9 - 12
Map of North and Central America. Different areas of the map are highlighted to indicate the habitat areas and 5 birds are superimposed on the map. The highlighted areas are concentrated in central Mexico, the west coast of the United states, and much of Canada and Alaska. Caption: they changed eye color from yellow to dark.
Ordinary Extraordinary Junco
Episode 4
14 minutes 10 seconds
Grade Level: 9 - 12
Bird with white belly, dark back and wings perched on a branch in a thicket. Caption: People are more like birds than we thought.
Ordinary Extraordinary Junco
Episode 1
2 minutes 54 seconds
Grade Level: 7 - 12
ASL
A small bird perched on a plank. Caption: Somehow, there was a critical mass action that took off.
Ordinary Extraordinary Junco
Episode 7
15 minutes 54 seconds
Grade Level: 9 - 12
Bird perched in a tree. Caption: That would be evidence of habitat adaptation.
Ordinary Extraordinary Junco
Episode 6
11 minutes 17 seconds
Grade Level: 9 - 12
Closeup of a bird on a branch. The bird has a light-colored body and a dark head. Caption: where they're evolving right before our eyes,
Ordinary Extraordinary Junco
Episode 8
3 minutes 11 seconds
Grade Level: 9 - 12
A bird's nest in the ground with a baby bird, beak open. Caption: There will be winners and losers each year.
Ordinary Extraordinary Junco
Episode 3
17 minutes 52 seconds
Grade Level: 9 - 12
A small bird perched on a person's hand. It is gay with some brown on the wings. Caption: It's much more olive-gray, duskier gray on the head.
Ordinary Extraordinary Junco
Episode 5
18 minutes 5 seconds
Grade Level: 9 - 12
3 people with hats, backpacks, and cameras and several horses, some with riders, hike up a dirt trail on a mountain amongst various flora in the fall. Caption. The mountains of Baja.
Ordinary Extraordinary Junco
Episode
1 hour 32 minutes
Grade Level: 9 - 12