Long-term effects of early parasite exposure on song duration and singing strategy in great tits
Long-term effects of early parasite exposure on song duration and singing strategy in great tits
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DOI：
10.1093/beheco/arp012
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发表时间：
2009-03-01
影响因子：
2.4
通讯作者：
Richner, Heinz
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Bischoff, Linda L.;Tschirren, Barbara;Richner, Heinz
鸣叫是许多鸟类的性选择特征，被认为是雄性健康和寄生虫抵抗力的信号。在这里，我们提出了一项实验现场研究，研究生命早期接触寄生虫对成年鸟类鸣叫的长期影响。我们将刚孵出的大山雀（Parus Major）暴露于外寄生母鸡跳蚤（Ceratophyllus gallinae）中，并在它们被招募到当地繁殖种群后评估了它们对其繁殖区域内具有挑战性的雄性回放的反应。据我们所知，我们首次在野生鸟类中发现，生命早期接触寄生虫会影响鸟类鸣叫：与在无跳蚤环境中长大的雄性相比，生命早期接触寄生虫的雄性鸣叫时间缩短了 32%。早期的寄生虫暴露还显着降低了歌曲与播放的重叠程度，这已被证明与社会地位相关。早期接触寄生虫对不同歌曲类型的演唱数量或延迟时间没有影响，直到雄性开始对播放做出声音反应。这些结果表明，配偶或竞争对手可以使用歌曲持续时间和歌曲重叠作为个体在生命早期接触寄生虫的代理。因此，它强调了寄生虫在维持性选择特征诚实方面的重要性以及寄生在降低吸引力和竞争力方面的成本。
Song is a sexually selected trait in many bird species and has been suggested to function as a signal of a male's health and parasite resistance. Here we present an experimental field study on the long-term effects of parasite exposure early in life on adult bird song. We exposed nestling great tits (Parus major) to ectoparasitic hen fleas (Ceratophyllus gallinae) and on their recruitment into the local breeding population assessed the response to a playback of a challenging male in their breeding territory. We show, to our knowledge for the first time in a wild bird population, that parasite exposure early in life affects bird song: song duration of males that were exposed to parasites early in life was reduced by 32% compared with males that grew up in a flea-free environment. Early parasite exposure also significantly reduced the degree of song overlap with the playback, which has been shown to correlate with social status. There was no effect of early parasite exposure on the number of different song types sung or on the latency until the males started the vocal response to the playback. These results suggest that mates or rivals can use song duration and song overlap as proxies for an individual's exposure to parasites early in life. It thereby highlights both the importance of parasites in maintaining honesty of sexually selected traits and the costs of parasitism in terms of reduced attractiveness and competitiveness.