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The 965th meeting of the Club was held on Tuesday 29 March 2011 in the Sherfield Building, Imperial College, South Kensington, London SW7 2AZ. Thirteen members and nine non-members were present.

      Members attending were: Miss H. BAKER (Chairman), Cdr. M. B. CASEMENT, RN, S. E. CHAPMAN, D. J. FISHER, A. GIBBS, K. HERON JONES, C. F. MANN, D. J. MONTIER, R. C. PRICE, Dr. R. P. PRYS-JONES, N. J. REDMAN, S. A. H. STATHAM and C. W. R. STOREY.

      Non-members attending were: Mrs C. R. CASEMENT, Ms P. ESTLER, Mrs B. HAMMOND-GIBBS, Mrs J. HERON JONES, G. JAMIE, Mrs M. MONTIER, P. RUDGE, Dr J. TOBIAS (Speaker) and Dr. T. TOEPFER.

      Joe Tobias spoke about the Neotropical ornithology research programme he is currently developing at the Edward Grey Institute in the Zoology Department at Oxford University. He commenced with a quick ‘tour’ to depict a representative sample of Amazonian bird diversity, including endemic families such as trumpeters (Psophiidae) and Hoatzin Opisthocomus hoazin (Opisthocomidae), and other key components of Neotropical avian communities such as guans (Cracidae), motmots (Momotidae), toucans (Ramphastidae) and jacamars (Galbulidae). He then reviewed current efforts to understand the ecology and behaviour of Amazonian birds, and to explain Amazonian diversity, which ranks as the highest in the world in terms of the number of species co-existing at single localities. Turning to research on antbirds (Thamnophilidae) he discussed recent findings from field observations and experiments that males and females sing year-round, often in duets, and that the function of male and female songs varies with context, sometimes reflecting cooperation and at other times conflict between the sexes. He also described how strong competition between antbird species has driven convergence in songs in some closely related species-pairs. At a regional scale, recent studies of Amazonian bird ranges provide support for Alfred Russel Wallace’s hypothesis that riverine barriers help to explain the divergence of avian lineages in the Amazon basin, and ultimately shape the patterns of diversity found today.