DOI: 10.5061/dryad.8pk0p2ntd
title: The Asian koel rapidly locates hosts breeding in novel nest sites

description: Avian brood parasites depend upon finding host nests to lay their eggs.
 However, how brood parasites find the nests of their hosts and select the
 nests for parasitism remains mostly unresolved. Here, we examined how a
 non-evicting brood parasite, the Asian koel (Eudynamys scolopaceus)
 selects the hosts' nests to lay their eggs. We provided a novel
 habitat (nest box, n=100) to the Asian koel and its host, the common myna
 (Acridotheres tristis), at a field site in central Bangladesh. A total of
 99 nests across 59 boxes were used by common mynas, of which 21.2% of
 these nests were parasitized by the Asian koel. Moreover, non-host
 species, the Oriental magpie robin (Copsychus saularis) (n=8) and jungle
 myna (Acridotheres fuscus) (n=6) also built nests in the boxes but none of
 these nests were parasitized. We found that active boxes were
 significantly more parasitized than inactive nest boxes. Among the active
 nest boxes, only common myna nests were parasitized by the Asian koel. We
 found a strong tendency for Asian koel selecting common myna nests more
 than the non-host species, Oriental magpie robin and jungle myna. Our
 results provide robust experimental support for the importance of host
 activity suggesting that Asian koels actively select occupied boxes. Our
 study shows support for the host imprinting hypothesis, where the Asian
 koel uses the host activity as a cue to search for potential nests, and
 then decide whether to parasitize.
description: We placed 100 nest boxes in the study area in March 2022 (Fig.
 1). Nest boxes were placed on trees about seven meters above the ground.
 All the nest boxes were located in areas usually utilized by common mynas.
 The dimension of the nest boxes was length 20.5 cm, width 20.5 cm, height
 30.5 cm, top cover 24.2 cm, and the entrance was 9.5 cm for 50 boxes and
 12.7 cm for another 50 boxes. The nest boxes were tied to trees with metal
 wires. We checked the nest boxes regularly to monitor nest building
 process by the common myna, and later to examine whether a clutch was
 parasitized by the Asian koel. Asian koel eggs were easily distinguished
 from common myna eggs by color, pattern, and size (Nahid et al. 2021).
 Moreover, Oriental magpie robin and jungle myna eggs were also easily
 distinguishable from Asian koel egg (Begum et al. 2012; Karim and Ahsan
 2016; Nahid et al. 2021).
description: This data files can be opened by Microsoft Excel.
description: # The Asian koel rapidly locates hosts breeding in novel nest sites --- *
 Dataset Title: Data for the article “Asian koels recognize the host, but
 not their nests, for brood parasitism” * Persistent Identifier:
 [https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.8pk0p2ntd](https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.8pk0p2ntd) * Dataset Contributors: Mominul Islam Nahid, Peter S. Ranke, and Wei Liang * Address of contributors: 1 Ministry of Education Key Laboratory for Ecology of Tropical Islands, Key Laboratory of Tropical Animal and Plant Ecology of Hainan Province, College of Life Sciences, Hainan Normal University, Haikou 571158, China 2 Centre for Biodiversity Dynamics (CBD), Department of Biology, Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU), Høgskoleringen 5, NO-7491 Trondheim, Norway 3 BirdLife Norway, Sandgata 30 B, NO-7012 Trondheim, Norway * Correspondence: Dr. Wei Liang ([liangwei@hainnu.edu.cn](mailto:liangwei@hainnu.edu.cn)) * Date of Issue: 2023-07-7 * Dataset citation: Nahid MI, Ranke PS, Liang W. 2023. Data for the article “Asian koels recognize the host, but not their nests, for brood parasitism”, Dryad, Dataset, [https://doi.org/doi_10.5061_dryad.8pk0p2ntd__v1](https://doi.org/doi_10.5061_dryad.8pk0p2ntd__v1) * Contextualized in experimental procedures and results: We placed 100 nest boxes in the study area in March 2022 (Fig. 1). Nest boxes were placed on trees about seven meters above the ground. All the nest boxes were located in areas usually utilized by common mynas. The dimension of the nest boxes was length 20.5 cm, width 20.5 cm, height 30.5 cm, top cover 24.2 cm and the entrance was 9.5 cm for 50 boxes and 12.7 cm for another 50 boxes. The nest boxes were tied to trees with metal wires. We checked the nests boxes regularly to monitor nest building process by the common myna, and later to examine whether a clutch was parasitized by the Asian koel. Asian koel eggs were easily distinguished from common myna eggs by color, pattern and size (Nahid et al. 2021). Moreover, Oriental magpie robin and jungle myna eggs were also easily distinguishable from Asian koel egg (Begum et al. 2012; Karim and Ahsan 2016; Nahid et al. 2021). A total of 99 nests across 59 boxes were used by common mynas, of which 21.2% of these nests were parasitized by the Asian koel. Moreover, non-host species, the Oriental magpie robin (Copsychus saularis) (n=8) and jungle myna (Acridotheres fuscus) (n=6) also built nests in the boxes but none of these nests were parasitized. We found that active boxes were significantly more parasitized than inactive nest boxes. Among the active nest boxes, only common myna nests were parasitized by the Asian koel. We found strong tendency for Asian koel selecting common myna nests more than the non-host species, Oriental magpie robin and jungle myna. Our results provide robust experimental support for the importance of host activity suggesting that Asian koels actively select occupied boxes. Our study shows support for the host imprinting hypothesis; where the Asian koel uses the host activity as a cue to search for potential nests, and then decide whether to parasitize. ## Description of the data and file structure This dataset include two Excel files, one for experimental data recording and another for data analysis. * File count: 1 files * Total file size: 38 KB * File formats: Microsoft Excel. 1. data1_common_myna ## Describe of the column header 1. data1_common_myna: Nest box_number: Number of nest box; Clutch number_Nest box: Clutch number of each nest box (clutch size); Clutch number_Total: Total clutch number of the study; Nest box Set_Day: Month date when nest box was installed; Nest box Set_Month: Month name when box was installed; Nest box Set_Month: day number in 365 days of the year when nest box was installed; Year: In which year the nest box was installed; Day_First: Date when first time egg/chick was found; Month: Month when first time egg/chick was found; Host_species: Species that used the nest box; Parasitised: If nest was parasitized or not; Parasite_Species: Brood parasite species; Main_locality: Locality where study was conducted; Locality: Specific locality within the study area; Vegetation_species: Tree name in English; Nest_height (foot, ft): Height at nest box placed (ft); Condition found_first: First time condition; Condition_found_egg/chick_first: Condition of egg/chick found; Host_eggs_final: Total host egg; Host egg_before hatch: Host egg number before hatch; Parasite_eggs_final: Total parasite egg; Parasite egg_before hatch: Parasite egg number before hatch; host_hatch: host hatching; cuckoo_hatch: number of cuckoo hatchlings; host_fledge: number of host fledglings; cuckoo_fledge: number of cuckoo fledglings. Missing values in the Excel table refer to no data/recording for this variable. ## Sharing/Access information * The dataset file can be loaded using Win RAR software to load package. * The two Excel files can be opened using Microsoft Excel software. # Additional Dataset Metadata ## Acknowledgements This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Nos. 31772453, 31970427 and 32270526 to WL) and by the specific research fund of The Innovation Platform for Academicians of Hainan Province. ## Dates and Locations * Dates of data collection: Data were collected from March to August, 2022 and in the period 2008-2017. * Geographic locations of data collection: Fieldwork was for the present experiment was carried out in Jahangirnagar University campus (23˚52´ N, 90˚16´ E), Bangladesh. # Methodological Information * Methods of data collection/generation: see manuscript for details.