The “Konrad Lorenz Duck Film Collection”: a monument to methodology and history of science re-discovered

Two hundred reels of 16-mm film, containing records of a variety of behavior patterns, mostly of dabbling ducks and geese, were discovered in the spring of 2010 in the attic of the Lorenz mansion in Altenberg––original footage, most of them taken by Konrad Lorenz himself, between 1950 and 1958 at his research station in Buldern (Westphalia, Germany) and at the Severn Wildfowl Trust in Slimbridge [Great Britain (now The Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust)]. These films are now available for further analysis at the Konrad Lorenz Institute for Evolution and Cognition Research, Altenberg Austria.