ArticleBehavioral ecology and sociobiology2012
Don't get the blues: conspicuous nuptial colouration of male moor frogs (Rana arvalis) supports visual mate recognition during scramble competition in large breeding aggregations.
Article in Behavioral ecology and sociobiology, 2012. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 19 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
19 citing papers in PubMed, 63 citations in OpenAlex.
- Color change, background choice, and camouflage in a nocturnal treefrog: implications for circadian adaptation.Zoological research · 2026Article
- Colour Confusion: Reviewing Ambiguities in the Identification and Classification of Chromatophore Deficiencies Among Amphibians.Ecology and evolution · 2025Review
- Circadian Rhythm of Body Color Change in the Juvenile Chinese Giant Salamander (Animals : an open access journal from MDPI · 2025Article
- Devastating disease can cause increased breeding effort and success that improves population resilience.Open biology · 2025Article
- Camouflage, conspicuousness, and inducible color change in a polymorphic, sexually dichromatic frog.Integrative organismal biology (Oxford, England) · 2025Article
- It's not easy being green: Comparing typical skin colouration among amphibians with colour abnormalities associated with chromatophore deficits.Ecology and evolution · 2024Article
- The relationship between spectral signals and retinal sensitivity in dendrobatid frogs.PloS one · 2024Article
- Colouration matters in dull toads: ultraviolet adornment for ladies and agrochemicals fading effects.Oecologia · 2023Article
- Evidence that catecholaminergic systems mediate dynamic colour change during explosive breeding events in toads.Biology letters · 2022Article
- Sexual repurposing of juvenile aposematism in locusts.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2022Article
- Article
- Sexual Dichromatism Drives Diversification within a Major Radiation of African Amphibians.Systematic biology · 2019Article
- Multimodal Signal Testing Reveals Gestural Tapping Behavior in Spotted Reed Frogs.Herpetologica · 2018Article
- Mating status correlates with dorsal brightness in some but not all poison frog populations.Ecology and evolution · 2017Article
- Colouration in amphibians as a reflection of nutritional status: The case of tree frogs in Costa Rica.PloS one · 2017Article
- Porphyrins produce uniquely ephemeral animal colouration: a possible signal of virginity.Scientific reports · 2016Article
- Ontogenetic Change of Signal Brightness in the Foot-Flagging Frog SpeciesHerpetologica · 2015Article
- From uni- to multimodality: towards an integrative view on anuran communication.Journal of comparative physiology. A, Neuroethology, sensory, neural, and behavioral physiology · 2014Review
- The neuro-hormonal control of rapid dynamic skin colour change in an amphibian during amplexus.PloS one · 2014Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
6 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
Conspicuous male colouration is expected to have evolved primarily through selection by female choice. In what way conspicuous colours could be advantageous to males scrambling for mates remains largely unknown. The moor frog (Rana arvalis) belongs to the so-called explosive breeders in which spawning period is short; intrasexual competition is strong, and males actively search and scramble for females. During breeding, male body colouration changes from a dull brown (similar to females) to a conspicuous blue, and we wanted to test if male blueness influences mating success or facilitates male mate recognition. To do so, we first measured the colour of mated and non-mated males using a spectrophotometer. In an experiment, we then analysed interactions of actual male moor frogs in natural spawning aggregations with a brown (resembling a female or a non-breeding male) and a blue model frog. Mated and non-mated males did not differ in colouration, suggesting that female choice based on colour traits was unlikely. In our behavioural experiment, male moor frogs spent significantly more time in contact and in amplexus with the brown model than with the blue model. Our results suggest that the nuptial colouration in moor frogs can act as a new type of visual signal in anurans evolved to promote instantaneous mate recognition allowing males to quickly move between rivals while scrambling for females. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (doi:10.1007/s00265-012-1412-6) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.