Natalie Cooper

We suspected we'd see a bias towards males because science is done by people and people have an inherent male bias, this is especially true as many of our collections come from the Victorian era of macho hunters going out trying to shoot the biggest fiercest creatures for their collections.

We were quite surprised by this as we thought things would be getting better, it could be unconscious bias where people don't even realize they're selecting males, it could be passive in that males are easier to catch or easier to see in the wild, or maybe conservation concerns leading collectors to avoid females.

One good example is the way we usually collect birds. You put up a mist net, then play male bird calls to attract other birds, these will mostly be males trying to defend their territories. Although it is studied far less frequently, female birds also call. So maybe using female calls too might help.