![]() It is important to recreate environmental conditions that best mimic those conditions found in the zebra finches’ natural habitat. Proper animal husbandry is an essential requirement for studying vocal learning in zebra finches as young chicks cannot be purchased commercially and therefore must be bred in the laboratory. Thus, there is a need for investigators to adopt good practices, as outlined here, for the successful rearing and breeding of zebra finches. 2009 Fee and Scharff 2010), and husbandry practices are important for the normal development of this trait. Learned song is culturally transmitted from adults to juveniles ( Feher et al. With appropriate care, they have an average lifespan of ~4 yr and can live up to 8 yr or even longer ( Austad 2011). They provide biparental care, with breeding possible at an age of 4 mo ( Austad 2011) and have a breeding frequency of three to four clutches per year. In the wild, zebra finches typically live in large colonial flocks, yet form longterm pair bonds ( Silcox and Evans 1982), with a moderate rate of generation of extrapaternity offspring ( Birkhead et al. It is commonly used in the laboratory, particularly for studies of vocal learning and the associated neural and genetic mechanisms of such learning. It is a small bird-wild adult females weighing on average 12.5 g, whereas males are lighter, averaging 12.2 g ( Zann 1996). The zebra finch Taeniopygia guttata castanotis is a songbird species native to mainland Australia. ![]() 2011), but cages that are long are preferred over those that are tall ( Bateson and Feenders 2010). Committee for the Update of the Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals. Minimum cage sizes have not been established for this species ( National Research Council. ( F) Three zebra finch hatchlings on hatch day one and a single unhatched egg. ( E) Clutch of six eggs in a nest composed of coconut fiber. Note the absence of the orange cheek patch typical of adult males. ( D) Juvenile zebra finch exhibiting chestnut markings on the flank (thick arrow) and black stripes on the throat (thin arrows) that are diagnostic of young males. ( B) Single housing unit from A showing a paper-lined floor, water bottles, food dispensers, cuttle bone and a nest box. ( A) A six-plex cage that is designed to house six pairs of breeding birds central cage dividers are removable to allow housing of five to six individuals. To make it more interactive and fun, images of friendly cartoons were added during the instruction phase of the game.Care and breeding of the zebra finch Taeniopygia guttata. The task was to basically press either “Z” if you see a box or “/” if you did not see the box AFTER hearing the computer say “Now,” I played around with the timing of the box flashing on screen and sound to test attention. ![]() Given that the participants were children, I had to design the game to be fun and child friendly. SART is a computer-based go/no-go task that requires participants to withhold behavioral response to a single, infrequent target presented amongst a background of frequent non-targets. The first game I coded was related to a sustained attention response task (SART). My primary role was to code the games on a computer for the children (age 6-7) to measure their attention and cognitive processing. Official certification in IRB training on human subjects, specifically children. Skills: Eprime, HTML, Python, experiment design, gamification, extensive research protocols for tasks.
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