Animal Behaviour

• Behaviour is known as everything an animal does. It is every action, reaction, and activity exhibited by animals in response to their environment and internal stimuli and includes everything animals do, from the way they move to the way they behave overall.
• Observing behaviour has always been important to humans. Animal behaviour has been studied in various forms for centuries, from the Ancient Greeks to Darwin.
• Karl von Frish studied honeybee behaviour and the ‘waggle dance’. He demonstrated how honeybees use a complex system of dances to communicate the location of food sources to members of the hive.
• Konrad Lorenz studied innate behaviours and imprinting. Imprinting occurs when young animals bond with first moving objects they see, usually their mother. His research formed the basis of our understanding of the genetic basis of behaviour. 
• Niko Tinbergen studied innate behaviours and supernormal stimuli.
• Studying animal behaviour is done for many reasons including being interesting to learn about, it being scientifically challenging, being useful, and being central to improving animal welfare.
• Phylogeny is the study of relationships among different groups of organisms and their evolutionary development.
• Innate behaviours are coded genetically, relate to critical actions for survival and reproduction. (performed by all animals of the species).
• Fixed action patterns are specific behavioural sequences that occur to a specific stimulus because of innate releasing mechanisms. Once triggered it will be performed until sequence is completed.
• Innate behaviours are key for fitness at a species level as they have a born predisposition to perform the innate behaviour. Not all behaviour is innate and even innate behaviours can be subject to learning.