Plumage colour is associated with partner parental care in mutually ornamented tree swallows

Male parental investment reflects the level of partner contributions and brood value in tree swallows

a Department of Biological Sciences, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA 6 b Department of Evolutionary Zoology and Human Biology, University of Debrecen, Debrecen, 7 Hungary 8 c Department of Psychology, Koç University, İstanbul, Turkey 9 d Department of Biology, Davidson College, Davidson, NC, USA 10 e Department of Biology, Bucknell University, Lewisburg, PA, USA 11 f Department of Biology, Q...

Glucocorticoids and parental effort in tree swallows (Tachycineta bicolor)

Relationships among plumage coloration, blood selenium concentrations and immune responses of adult and nestling tree swallows.

In a number of taxa, males and females both display ornaments that may be associated with individual quality and could be reliable signals to potential mates or rivals. We examined the iridescent blue/green back and white breast of adult tree swallows (Tachycineta bicolor) to determine whether plumage reflectance is related to adult or offspring immune responses. We simultaneously addressed the...

Strategic adjustment of parental care in tree swallows: life-history trade-offs and the role of glucocorticoids

Life-history theory predicts that optimal strategies of parental investment will depend on ecological and social factors, such as current brood value and offspring need. Parental care strategies are also likely to be mediated in part by the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis and glucocorticoid hormones. Here, we present an experiment in tree swallows (Tachycineta bicolor), a biparental songbir...

Mutations of TYR and MITF Genes are Associated with Plumage Colour Phenotypes in Geese

The polymorphism of microphthalmia-associated transcription factor (MITF) and tyrosinase (TYR) genes have been proposed to play a vital role in coat colour genesis in mammals, but their role remains ambiguous in geese at best. Here, we cloned and sequenced 1,397 bp coding region of MITF gene and a 588 bp fragment of TYR exon 1 for polymorphism analysis among 157 domestic geese showing three typ...