ArticleProceedings. Biological sciences2013
A window on the past: male ornamental plumage reveals the quality of their early-life environment.
Article in Proceedings. Biological sciences, 2013. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 12 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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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.
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Who cites it
12 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 32 citations in OpenAlex.
- Direct benefits of mate choice: a meta-analysis of plumage colour and offspring feeding rates in birds.Die Naturwissenschaften · 2015Pooled it
- Experimental data suggest between population reversal in the condition dependence of two sexually selected traits.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Family resemblance in color-patch size is not affected by stress experience in a cichlid fish.Ecology and evolution · 2024Article
- Sexually selected traits as bioindicators: exposure to mercury affects carotenoid-based male bill color in zebra finches.Ecotoxicology (London, England) · 2020Article
- Colour pattern predicts outcome of female contest competition in a sexually monomorphic fish.Biology letters · 2018Article
- Himalayan black bulbuls (Hypsipetes leucocephalus niggerimus) exhibit sexual dichromatism under ultraviolet light that is invisible to the human eye.Scientific reports · 2017Article
- Genetic conflict between sexual signalling and juvenile survival in the three-spined stickleback.BMC evolutionary biology · 2016Article
- Dominant male song performance reflects current immune state in a cooperatively breeding songbird.Ecology and evolution · 2016Article
- Quantitative genetics of plumage color: lifetime effects of early nest environment on a colorful sexual signal.Ecology and evolution · 2015Article
- Foraging for carotenoids: do colorful male hihi target carotenoid-rich foods in the wild?Behavioral ecology : official journal of the International Society for Behavioral Ecology · 2014Article
- Sexually selected dichromatism in the hihi Notiomystis cincta: multiple colours for multiple receivers.Journal of evolutionary biology · 2014Article
- Can environmental conditions experienced in early life influence future generations?Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2014Review
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
5 authors at 3 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
Abstract
It is well established that the expression of many ornamental traits is dependent on the current condition of the bearer. However, conditions experienced in early life are also known to be important for an individual's subsequent fitness and therefore, directly or indirectly, for the fitness of their mate. Specifically, a recent hypothesis suggests that sexually selected traits might be sensitive to conditions experienced during early-life development and thereby function as honest indicators of developmental history. Whether this applies to colourful male plumage, however, is largely unknown. We tested this idea with a field experiment by manipulating neonatal nutrition in a sexually dichromatic passerine, the hihi (Notymystis cincta). We found that carotenoid supplementation increased nestling plasma carotenoid concentration, which was in turn correlated with increased yellow saturation in male breeding plumage after moulting. We also found that the post-moult luminance (lightness) of the white ear-tufts tended to be reduced in males that had received an all-round nutritional supplement as nestlings. Black breeding plumage was not affected by neonatal nutritional treatment. Although the mechanisms that generate colourful plumage are evidently diverse, our results show that at least some parts of this display are accurate indicators of environmental conditions during development.
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Registered trials
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