八声杜鹃与长尾缝叶莺的协同进化研究

杜鹃和宿主协同进化的研究，是鸟类学、行为学和进化生物学研究的热点和前沿问题。通过前一基金的资助，本项目组对大杜鹃与灰喉鸦雀的协同进化开展了研究，发现杜鹃寄生是导致鸦雀卵色多态性进化的分裂选择机制。但这种卵色多态性及其机制是否还存在于别的杜鹃种类，尚需进一步研究，以验证这种机制的普遍意义。本研究拟采用无线电遥测、光纤光谱仪、模型卵实验和杜鹃标本野外测试等技术和方法，在中国多杜鹃共存寄生系统中，深入研究八声杜鹃(Cacomantis merulinus)对长尾缝叶莺(Orthotomus sutorius)的巢寄生行为及其协同进化关系，对丰富和完善鸟类巢寄生理论具有重要现实和理论意义。

Natural selection should favour hosts' defense and these, will in turn select for cuckoos' better trickery. Such co-evolution between cuckoos and their hosts has been being extensively studied in behavioural ecology and evolutionary biology. Our previous work constituted the first to report the influence of disruptive selection on evolution of discrete phenotypes in both parasite and host traits in the parrotbill-cuckoo system. However, the influence of disruptive selection on evolution of discrete phenotypes should be extended in other avian brood parasitism system.The present proposal will study the interaction between the plaintive cuckoo(Cacomantis merulinus)and its main host, the common tailorbird(Orthotomus sutorius), using radio-tracking, fiber spectrophotometer, model eggs and dummy cuckoo experiments in the field. This stduy, therefore, will play an important role in international co-operation and co-evolution research on avian brood parasitism.