Feathered architects: Collecting histories of anthropogenic material in birds' nests

In recent years, numerous examples of birds incorporating artificial or anthropogenic materials into their nests - from anti-bird spikes in the Netherlands to fiber optic cables in eastern Ukraine - have made headlines. Yet the appearance of these nests is not a new phenomenon, with ornithologists documenting the use of artificial materials in birds' nests since at least the nineteenth century. In this paper, I argue that nests containing anthropogenic items demonstrate how natural history collections can act as sites where ideas about the environment, its animal inhabitants, and the human impact upon it are made. In the long nineteenth century, nests constructed from items such as watch springs, hair pins, and textiles were interpreted as evidence of avian intelligence. In the twentieth century, corvid nests of metal wire were associated with economic and ecological desolation, but also with urbanization and the emergence of animal cultures. The twenty-first century has seen scientific and popular interest in artificial nest material surge. Birds now incorporate everything from plastic packaging to cigarette butts in their nests and these structures are simultaneously celebrated and lamented. Nests are now seen as both proof of the remarkable intelligence of birds and as signs of the unsustainable impact of humanity on the environment. Natural history collections have been central in understanding these developments. Looking at birds' nests - and the items within them - is occasionally rewarded with a snapshot of the present state of the Anthropocene.