Do cuckoos choose nests of great reed warblers on the basis of host egg appearance?
Do cuckoos choose nests of great reed warblers on the basis of host egg appearance?
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DOI：
10.1111/j.1420-9101.2007.01308.x
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发表时间：
2007-05-01
影响因子：
2.1
通讯作者：
Moskat, C.
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Cherry, M. I.;Bennett, A. T. D.;Moskat, C.
流行的理论假设杜鹃随机分布在种群内的宿主巢中，尽管有人提出杜鹃可以选择较大的巢和宿主种群中相对活跃的巢对。我们测试了这样一种假设，即杜鹃选择寄主卵子与自己更接近的巢，通过评估匹配和监测自然或实验寄生于欧洲杜鹃卵的大芦鹭的巢命运，可以改善卵匹配。杜鹃和寄主卵视觉特征之间的正相关表明，杜鹃并不是在一个种群内随机产卵，而是选择巢，这会改善卵的匹配：自然寄生的杜鹃卵更像人类感知的和通过分光光度法测量的寄主卵。我们的结果表明在杜鹃-宿主进化军备竞赛中迄今被忽视的一步，并对人工寄生离合器的常见实验实践具有重要意义。
Prevailing theory assumes cuckoos lay at random among host nests within a population, although it has been suggested that cuckoos could choose large nests and relatively active pairs within host populations. We tested the hypothesis that egg matching could be improved by cuckoos choosing nests in which host eggs more closely match their own, by assessing matching and monitoring nest fate in great reed warblers naturally or experimentally parasitized by eggs of European cuckoos. A positive correlation between cuckoo and host egg visual features suggests that cuckoos do not lay at random within a population, but choose nests and this improves egg matching: naturally parasitized cuckoo eggs were more similar to host eggs as perceived by humans and as measured by spectrophotometry. Our results suggest a hitherto overlooked step in cuckoo-host evolutionary arms races, and have nontrivial implications for the common experimental practice of artificially parasitizing clutches.