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Avian colour perception predicts behavioural responses to experimental brood parasitism in chaffinches
Author(s) -
AVILÉS J. M.,
VIKAN J. R.,
FOSSøY F.,
ANTONOV A.,
MOKSNES A.,
RØSKAFT E.,
STOKKE B. G.
Publication year - 2010
Publication title -
journal of evolutionary biology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.289
H-Index - 128
eISSN - 1420-9101
pISSN - 1010-061X
DOI - 10.1111/j.1420-9101.2009.01898.x
Subject(s) - biology , brood parasite , parasitism , host (biology) , zoology , parasite hosting , perception , ecology , evolutionary biology , neuroscience , world wide web , computer science
Hosts of cuckoos have evolved defences allowing them to discriminate and reject parasite eggs. Mechanisms of discrimination are mostly visually mediated, and have been studied using approaches that do not account for what the receiver (i.e. host) actually can discriminate. Here, for the first time we apply a perceptual model of colour discrimination to study behavioural responses to natural variation in parasite egg appearance in chaffinches Fringilla coelebs . Discrimination of parasite eggs gradually increased with increasing differences in chromatic contrasts as perceived by birds between parasite and host eggs. These results confirm that colour differences of the eggs as perceived by birds are important integral parts of a matching signal used by chaffinch hosts.