trait macroevolution 9 10 Statement of authorship: JPM and JGB designed the study. JPM and ZZ compiled 11 data from the literature. JPM performed statistical analyses with input from JGB. JPM 12 and JGB wrote the manuscript, and ZZ contributed to revisions. 13 14 Data accessibility statements: Data were obtained from existing sources in the 15 literature, cited in the manuscript. Abstract: 33 34Passerine birds build a diversity of nests to lay and incubate eggs, and to house nestlings. 35Open cup, dome, and hole (or cavity) nests have distinct advantages and/or disadvantages 36 related to predation risk and thermoregulation. We used macroecological and 37 macroevolutionary approaches to test contrasting predictions from considering these 38 consequences. Patterns of prevalence across latitude and elevation for the roofed nest 39 types (holes and domes) provide no evidence that their thermoregulation benefits promote 40 colonization of colder environments. These patterns are more consistent with the role of 41 predation in determining where dome-nesting species in particular occur. 42Macroevolutionary analyses suggest that diversity patterns for nest types along major 43 ecological gradients mostly arise from how clades with conserved nest types have 44 diversified across gradients, rather than arising from local adaptation. Lastly, we reveal a 45 negative relationship between body mass and latitude in hole-nesting passerines, which 46
36Signals used in animal communication, especially those that are learned, are thought to be 37 prone to rapid and/or regular evolution. It has been hypothesized that the evolution of song 38 learning in birds has resulted in elevated diversification rates, as learned song may be subject to 39 especially rapid evolution, and song is involved in mate choice. However, we know little about 40 the evolutionary modes of learned song divergence over timescales relevant to speciation. Here 41 we provide evidence that aspects of the territorial songs of Eastern Afromontane sky island 42 sunbirds Cinnyris evolve in a punctuated fashion, with periods of stasis, on the order of 43 hundreds of thousands of years or more, broken up by strong evolutionary pulses. Stasis in 44 learned songs is inconsistent with learned traits being subject to constant or frequent change, 45 as would be expected if selection does not constrain song phenotypes, or if novel phenotypes 46 are frequently advantageous. Learned song may instead follow a process resembling peak 47 shifts on adaptive landscapes. While much research has focused on the potential for rapid 48 evolution in bird song, our results suggest that selection can tightly constrain the evolution of 49 learned songs over fairly long timescales. More broadly, these results demonstrate that some 50 aspects of highly variable, plastic traits can exhibit punctuated evolution, with stasis over fairly 51 long time periods. 52 53 Introduction: 54
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