Three words I would use to describe the research I am conducting would be:
Competition
Habitat Structure
Behavior
When initially coming up with the topic for my hypothesis, it seemed that there was some type of competition going on between the chickadees and nuthatches in their foraging techniques, and their behavior towards humans. When making my observations, as with any research study, there is great variation in the behavior and presence/absence of both species, but it seems as of now that there is some underlying process affecting the behavior of chickadees in the presence of nuthatches. I am studying this topic at an interesting time when more bird species become present in the area, so the seasonal changes may also present new factors to explore. Another underlying process may be related to habitat structure, and where birds choose to forage. As I continue to conduct my point count stations, the data may reveal more information on the importance of location as it pertains to bird behavior, and where they tend to forage.