Paper: Evidence that sensory traps can evolve into honest signals

From: Robert Karl Stonjek (rstonjek_at_bigpond.net.au)
Date: 03/23/05 

Date: Wed, 23 Mar 2005 16:32:47 -0500 (EST)

Evidence that sensory traps can evolve into honest signals

CONSTANTINO MACÍAS GARCIA AND ELVIA RAMIREZ

Departamento de Ecología Evolutiva, Instituto de Ecología, UNAM, AP 70-275,
CP 04510 México DF, México

Conventional models explaining extreme sexual ornaments propose that these
reflect male genetic quality or are arbitrary results of genetic linkage
between female preference and the ornament. The chase-away model emphasizes
sexual conflict: male signals attract females because they exploit receiver
biases. As males gain control of mating decisions, females may experience
fitness costs through suboptimal mating rates or post-copulatory
exploitation. Elaboration of male signals is expected if females increase
their response threshold to resist such exploitation. If ornaments target
otherwise adaptive biases such as feeding responses, selection on females
might eventually separate sexual and non-sexual responses to the signal.
Here we show that the terminal yellow band (TYB) of several Goodeinae
species evokes both feeding and sexual responses; sexual responsiveness
phylogenetically pre-dates the expression of the TYB in males and is
comparable across taxa, yet feeding responsiveness decreases in species with
more elaborated TYBs. Displaying a TYB is costly, and thus provides an
example where a trait arose as a sensory trap but has evolved into an honest
signal.

Full Text at Nature
http://www.nature.com/cgi-taf/DynaPage.taf?file=/nature/journal/v434/n7032/abs/nature03363_fs.html

Posted by
Robert Karl Stonjek

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