African Honeyguides

Research on a remarkable
human-animal relationship

Dr Dominic Cram

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Dominic Cram

Biography

My research investigates cooperation in the natural world, with an emphasis on how cooperating impacts health and ageing. I have worked on several wild bird and mammal species and study a range of markers of animal health, including oxidative damage, antioxidant protection, and telomere length analysis. My PhD research with white-browed sparrow weavers demonstrated that the physiological costs of rearing young fall heaviest on those that breed most, but that these costs can be mitigated by cooperative sharing of workloads. In my first post-doctoral position, I showed that social dominance in cooperative groups of Kalahari meerkats is not associated with specialised slow ageing trajectories, and that sibling rivalries can accelerate ageing even in new-born pups.

Research focus

My current focus is on the honeyguide’s contribution to the mutualistic foraging partnership with humans. After a successful harvest, the grateful honey-hunter typically leaves a piece of beeswax to reward the bird that guided them to the bees. However, our observations indicate that other honeyguides often eat this wax. If honeyguides can steal wax without guiding, how is the mutualism maintained? Which individual honeyguides cooperate with human honey-hunters, and which instead try to ‘scrounge’ a free meal? Are some honeyguides better guides than others? Do honeyguides that cooperate have access to more beeswax?

To address these questions, I have established a ringed population of honeyguides which allows us to collect individual-based data on decisions to guide or scrounge, guiding outcomes, and wax consumption. I am combining observational and experimental field data with laboratory analyses including stable isotope diet reconstruction and telomere length analysis.

Selected recent publications:

(Please see Google Scholar for a full publication list)

van der Wal, J.E.M., D’Amelio, P.B., Dauda, C., Cram, D.L., Wood, B.M., & Spottiswoode, C.N. 2026. Cooperative human signals to honeyguides form local dialects. People and Nature, 00: 1–13.
Cram, D.L., Lloyd-Jones, D.J., van der Wal, J.E.M., Lund, J., Buanachique, I.O., Muamedi, M., Nanguar, C.I., Ngovene, A., Raveh, S., Boner, W., Spottiswoode, C.N. 2023. Guides and cheats: producer-scrounger dynamics in the human-honeyguide mutualism. Proceedings Royal Society B 290, 20232024.
van der Wal, J.E.M., Afan, A.I., Anyawire, M., Begg, C.M., Begg, K.S., Dabo, G.A., Gedi, I.I., Harris, J.A., Isack, H.A., Ibrahim^,J.I., Jamie, G.A., Kamboe^,W.-B.W., Kilawi, A.O., Kingston, A., Laltaika, E.A., Lloyd-Jones, D.J., M’manga, G.M., Muhammad, N.Z., Ngcamphalala, C.A., Nhlabatsi, S.O., Oleleteyo, T.T., Sanda, M., Tsamkxao, L., Wood, B.M., Spottiswoode, C.N., Cram, D.L. 2023 Do honey badgers and greater honeyguide birds cooperate to access bees’ nests? Ecological evidence and honey-hunter accounts. Journal of Zoology 321: 22-32 DOI: 10.1111/jzo.13093 Read abstract in English and Kiswahili here
Cram, D.L., van der Wal, J.E.M., Uomini, N.T., Cantor, M., Afan, A.I., Attwood, M.C., Amphaeris, J., Balasani, F., Blair, C.J., Bronstein, J.L., Buanachique, I.O., Cuthill, R.R.T., Das, J., Daura-Jorge, F.G., Deb, A., Dixit, T., Dlamini, G.S., Dounias, E., Gedi, I.I., Gruber, M., Hoffman, L.S., Holzlehner, T., Isack, H.A., Laltaika, A.E., Lloyd-Jones, D.J., Lund, J., Machado, A.M.S., Mahadevan, L., Moreno, I.B., Nwaogu, C.J., Pierotti, R., Rucunua, S.A., dos Santos, W.F., Serpa, N., Smith, B.D., Sridhar, H., Tolkova, I., Tun, T., Valle-Pereira, J.V.S., Wood, B.M., Wrangham, R.W. & Spottiswoode, C.N. 2022 The ecology and evolution of human-wildlife cooperation. People and Nature 4: 841-855. Read abstract in English, Portuguese and Kiswahili here
van der Wal, J.E.M., Spottiswoode, C.N., Uomini, N.T., Cantor, M., Daura-Jorge, F.G., Afan, A.I., Attwood, M.C., Amphaeris, J., Balasani, F., Begg, C.M., Blair, C.J., Bronstein, J.L., Buanachique, I.O., Cuthill, R.R.T., Das, J., Deb, A., Dixit, T., Dlamini, G.S., Dounias, E., Gedi, I.I., Gruber, M., Hoffman, L.S., Holzlehner, T., Isack, H.A., Laltaika, A.E., Lloyd-Jones, D.J., Lund, J., Machado, A.M.S., Mahadevan, L., Moreno, I.B., Nwaogu, C.J., Pereira, V.L., Pierotti, R., Rucunua, S.A., dos Santos, W.F., Serpa, N., Smith, B.D., Tolkova, I., Tun, T., Valle-Pereira, J.V.S., Wood, B.M., Wrangham, R.W. & Cram, D.L. 2022 Safeguarding human-wildlife cooperation. Conservation Letters e12886 Read abstract in English, Portuguese and Kiswahili here.
Cram, D., Monaghan, P., Gillespie, R., Dantzer, B., Duncan, C., Spence-Jones, H. & Clutton-Brock, T. 2018 Rank-related contrasts in longevity arise from extra-group excursions, not delayed senescence, in a cooperative mammal. Current Biology 28: 2934-2939.
Cram, D., Monaghan, P., Gillespie, R. & Clutton-Brock, T. 2017 Effects of early-life competition and maternal nutrition on telomere lengths in wild meerkats. Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences 284: 20171383
Cram, D., Blount, J. & Young A. 2015 The oxidative costs of reproduction are group-size dependent in a wild cooperative breeder. Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences 282: 20152031.

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News

New study shows that honey-hunter calls vary regionally like dialects

Jan 22, 2026

We have published a new study in People and Nature showing that people in northern Mozambique use regionally distinct “dialects” when communicating with honeyguides. Led by Jessica van der Wal, the paper shows that human–honeyguide communication varies across landscapes in ways that mirror regional variation in human languages. Despite these differences in calls, cooperation between people and honeyguides remains successful and important for human livelihoods across the Niassa Special Reserve, suggesting that both species adjust to one another across their shared landscape.

New paper on honey-hunting with honeyguides in western Africa

Dec 4, 2025

We are pleased to share our new paper on honey-hunting with honeyguides, in western Africa this time. Led by Wiro-Bless Kamboe as part of his MSc project, and co-authored with Claire Spottiswoode and Timothy Khan Aikins, with Jessica van der Wal as senior author, the study documents honey-hunting practices in northern Ghana and explores the involvement of greater honeyguides. We found that while mutualism persists, it occurs at lower levels than those documented in eastern and southern Africa. Honey-hunters in Ghana often visit known bees’ nests without honeyguides’ help, and discarded beeswax continues to supplement the birds’ diet. We found no clear evidence that socio-economic changes, such as increased access to motorised transport, have disrupted this relationship.

Dr David Lloyd-Jones graduates with his PhD

Sep 9, 2025

Dr David Lloyd-Jones graduated with his PhD from the University of Cape Town, entitled “Cooperation, ecology and behaviour in the honeyguide-human mutualism” – congratulations, David, on this wonderful outcome of many happy years of fieldwork in the Niassa Special Reserve together with our honey-hunter collaborators and friends, supported by the Mariri Environmental Centre.