Cigarette butts repel nest pests

摘要

City-dwelling sparrows and finches incorporate the butts of smoked cigarettes into their nests, seemingly to ward off parasitic mites.Isabel Lopez-Rull and her colleagues at the National Autonomous University of Mexico in Mexico City found that nests of house sparrows (Passer domesticus) and house finches (Carpodacus mexicanus; pictured) with higher levels of cellulose acetate, a component of cigarette butts, had fewer mites.