Evolutionary Significance of Geographic Variation in a Plumage-Based Foraging Adaptation: An Experimental Test in the Slate-Throated Redstart (Myioborus Miniatus)

Abstract

Geographic variation in the plumage pattern of birds is widespread but poorly understood, and in very few cases has its evolutionary significance been investigated experimentally. Neotropical warblers of the genus Myioborus use their contrasting black-and-white plumage to flush insect prey during animated foraging displays. Although previous experimental work has demonstrated that white plumage patches are critical to flush-pursuit foraging success, the amount of white in the plumage shows considerable interspecific and intraspecific geographic variation. We investigated the evolutionary significance of this geographic variation by experimentally decreasing or increasing the amount of white in the tail of slate-throated redstarts (Myioborus miniatus comptus) from Monteverde, Costa Rica, to mimic the natural extremes of tail pattern variation in this species. In addition to measuring the effects of plumage manipulation on foraging performance, we performed field experiments measuring the escape response of a common insect prey species (an asilid fly) using model redstarts representing four different Myioborus plumage patterns. Our experiments were designed to test four hypotheses that could explain geographic variation in plumage pattern. Compared to controls, experimental birds with reduced-white tails that mimic the plumage pattern of M. miniatus hellmayri of Guatemala showed significant reductions in flush-pursuit foraging performance. In contrast, the addition of white to the tail to mimic the plumage pattern of M. miniatus verticalis of Bolivia had no significant effect on foraging performance of Costa Rican redstarts. In field experiments with asilid flies, model redstarts simulating the plumage of M. miniatus comptus of Costa Rica and M. miniatus verticalis of Bolivia elicited greater responses than did models of other Myioborus taxa with either less or more white in the plumage. The results of our experiments with both birds and insects allow us to reject two hypotheses for geographic variation in plumage pattern: (1) that geographic variation is a nonadaptive result of genetic drift, and (2) that selection for enhanced flush-pursuit foraging performance generally favors increased white in the plumage, but evolutionary trade-offs constrain the evolution of extensive patches of white in some geographic regions. Instead, our results suggest that geographic variation in the plumage pattern of Myioborus redstarts reflects adaptation to regional habitat characteristics that enhances flush-pursuit foraging performance.

Contemporary genetic structure of the northern bobwhite west of the Mississippi River

“…Central American subspecies of the slate-throated redstart (Myioborus miniatus) are indistinct with regard to mtDNA variation, but these 4 subspecies rapidly evolved extensive differentiation among tail patterns and foraging behaviors during the late Pleistocene (Pérez-Emán et al 2010). Because nuclear genes that control phenotypic traits and mitochondrial genes have different rates of evolution (Edwards et al 2005, Mumme et al 2006, Kearns et al 2009, Pérez-Emán et al 2010, mtDNA alone cannot be used to diagnose subspecies. If our estimates of the timing of population expansion are valid, plumage variation among subspecies of bobwhites in the United States may also be of relatively recent origin.…”

Testing the molecular and evolutionary causes of a ‘leapfrog’ pattern of geographical variation in coloration

“…Accordingly, repeated evolution of plumage traits leading to leapfrog patterns might result from independent mutations of conspicuous effect in the same gene (Wood et al, 2005;Manceau et al, 2010), with the possible array of expressed phenotypes limited by development. The fixation of alternative traits in different populations may result from genetic drift as originally proposed by Remsen (1984), but given the role of plumage in contexts such as crypsis, mate recognition and social signalling, different forms of selection could also play prominent roles (Dumbacher & Fleischer, 2001;Norman et al, 2002;Mumme et al, 2006;Filardi & Smith, 2008;Tibbets & Safran, 2009;Antoniazza et al, 2010).…”

Habitat-Specific Sensory-Exploitative Signals in Birds: Propensity of Dipteran Prey to Cause Evolution of Plumage Variation in Flush-Pursuit Insectivores

“…Our earlier studies on flush-pursuit foraging in birds (Jabłoń ski 1999(Jabłoń ski , 2001Jabłoń ski andStrausfeld 2000, 2001;Mumme 2002;Galatowitsch and Mumme 2004;Mumme at al. 2006) suggest that flush-pursuing birds and their prey could be used to study the combined effects of the receiver sensitivity and habitat properties on geographical variation of sensory-exploitative signals because they comprise a system with clear costs to receivers and with relatively well-understood neurobiological and adaptive bases for the receiver's sensitivity and the signalers' signals.…”

“…Some of the flush pursuers, such as the Myioborus redstarts and the Rhipidura fantails, exhibit high inter-and intraspecific geographic variation in the pattern and extent of white plumage patches (Ford 1981;Blakers et al 1984;Curson et al 1994) that are conspicuously presented towards insect prey, including high numbers of Diptera (Cameron 1985;Barber et al 2000). For example, the slate-throated redstart (M. miniatus), which is broadly distributed in Neotropical montane rainforests, displays high geographic variation in tail-patch size among subspecies (Galatowitsch and Mumme 2004;Mumme et al 2006). Tail-patch size in the painted redstart (M. pictus) also changes from small in Guatemala (Fig.…”