A scientific team led by the Doñana Biological Station (CSIC) and the University of Barcelona have found that many quails with darker coloration have a large chromosomal inversion. Birds with the inversion are darker, heavier, and have rounder wings, which suggest a poorer flight efficiency.
Darker quails are abundant in the southwest of the Iberian Peninsula. The researchers have found that quails with this chromosomal inversion are associated with a lack of or reduced migration.

Petrels are highly philopatric and return from migratory journeys of thousands of kilometres to breed in the same burrow year after year. During the breeding season, some burrowing petrel species rely on their sense of smell to locate their nest at night, but the mechanisms involved in the homing behaviour after several months at sea are virtually unknown. To understand whether the sense of smell is involved in nest finding at the return from migration and to study the interplay with other...