Abstract:Conspicuous ornaments in animals can evolve to reveal individual quality when their production/maintenance costs make them reliable as signals or if their expression level is intrinsically linked to quality by some unfalsifiable mechanism (quality indices). The latter has been mostly associated with traits constrained by body size. However, red ketocarotenoid-based coloured ornaments may also have evolved as quality indices because their production could be closely linked to individual metabolism and, particul… Show more
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