Margaret Morse Nice Essay

Margaret Morse Nice took an interest in nature at the young age of 13, and soon after became even more intrigued by the patterns, social aspects, and lifestyles of birds. Later in life this led to her becoming an ornithologist. Margaret was born on December 6, 1883, in Amherst, Massachusetts. She was born to her mother Margaret Dungan and her father Anson D. Morse who was a professor at Amherst College. Nice was one of six brothers and sisters. After graduating from high school Margaret got a degree from Mt. Holyoke College in 1906 where she studied numerous languages such as German, French, and Latin just to name a few. Studying these languages will eventually help Nice when she begins her life an ornithologist. After being inspired by two professors, she took an incredible interest in natural sciences. Soon she felt it was time to get a master’s degree and began at Clark University where she met her soon to be husband Leonard Blaine Nice who was obtaining his Ph.D. in physiology. Here, she obtained her degree …show more content…
Nice contributed to many of the facts we know about birds today. Some types of birds Margaret studied were: cowbirds, storks, song sparrows, magnolia warbler, olive sided flycatcher, and shore birds just to name a few. Specific research done on these birds include: observations on the young cowbird, laying rhythm of cowbirds, storks in trees, relationships between the sexes in the song sparrow, study of nesting of magnolia warblers, and observations of shore birds in Oklahoma. She studied things such as play behavior and how large brain size and prolonged development are seen potentially as intelligent behavior. She spent time learning about the relationships between behaviorisms that indicated cognitive function and other attributes such as rate of development, age maturity, and life