Empirical tests of the role of disruptive coloration in reducing detectability
Empirical tests of the role of disruptive coloration in reducing detectability
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DOI：
10.1098/rspb.2007.0153
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发表时间：
2007-05-22
影响因子：
4.7
通讯作者：
Sherratt, Thomas N.
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Fraser, Stewart;Callahan, Alison;Sherratt, Thomas N.
破坏性图案是一种潜在的通用伪装技术，被认为通过使身体形状的检测更加困难来增强隐蔽性。在最近的一系列野外实验中，带有延伸到“翅膀”边缘的标记的人造飞蛾比具有向内移位的相同边缘图案的飞蛾存活率更高。虽然这个结果似乎表明了模糊边缘的好处，但可能的是，向内移位的图案的较高密度标记伴随着降低了它们的背景匹配程度。同样，有人认为，放置在人工飞蛾上的粉虫诱饵可能会与不同的飞蛾模式产生差异。为了解决这些问题，我们进行了对照试验，在这些试验中，人类受试者搜索计算机生成的飞蛾图像，而不是橡树图像。蛾与边缘扩展破坏性标记存活率较高，并需要更长的时间才能找到，比所有其他蛾类型，是否顺序或同时提出。然而，没有边缘标记和内部图案密度降低的蛾比高密度的蛾存活得更好，这表明背景匹配可能在早期实验中发挥了迄今为止未被认识到的作用。我们的破坏性图案的非背景匹配蛾也有最低的整体生存率，这表明破坏性着色本身可能无法提供显着的保护，从捕食者。总的来说，我们的研究结果提供了独立的支持破坏性标记的生存价值，并表明有共同的特点，人类和鸟类的伪装感知。
Disruptive patterning is a potentially universal camouflage technique that is thought to enhance concealment by rendering the detection of body shapes more difficult. In a recent series of field experiments, artificial moths with markings that extended to the edges of their 'wings' survived at higher rates than moths with the same edge patterns inwardly displaced. While this result seemingly indicates a benefit to obscuring edges, it is possible that the higher density markings of the inwardly displaced patterns concomitantly reduced their extent of background matching. Likewise, it has been suggested that the mealworm baits placed on the artificial moths could have created differential contrasts with different moth patterns. To address these concerns, we conducted controlled trials in which human subjects searched for computer-generated moth images presented against images of oak trees. Moths with edge-extended disruptive markings survived at higher rates, and took longer to find, than all other moth types, whether presented sequentially or simultaneously. However, moths with no edge markings and reduced interior pattern density survived better than their high-density counterparts, indicating that background matching may have played a so-far unrecognized role in the earlier experiments. Our disruptively patterned non-back-ground-matching moths also had the lowest overall survivorship, indicating that disruptive coloration alone may not provide significant protection from predators. Collectively, our results provide independent support for the survival value of disruptive markings and demonstrate that there are common features in human and avian perception of camouflage.