Imperfect mimicry of host begging calls by a brood parasitic cuckoo:a cue for nestling rejection by hosts?  

作　　者：Hee-Jin NOH Ros GLOAG Ana V.LEITAO Naomi E.LANGMORE 

机构地区：[1]Research School of Biology,Australian National University,Canberra ACT 0200,Australia [2]School of Life and Environmental Sciences,University of Sydney,Sydney,NSW 2006,Australia [3]School of Biosciences,University of Melbourne,Parkville VIC 3010,Australia

出　　处：《Current Zoology》2021年第6期665-674,共10页动物学报（英文版）

基　　金：supported by an Australian Research Council Discovery Grant(DP180100021,DP150101652);the Holsworth Grant,Australia&Pacific Science Foundation(APSF1406);Birdlife Australia(2015).

摘　　要：Coevolutionary interactions between avian brood parasites and their hosts often lead to the evolution of discrimination and rejection of parasite eggs or chicks by hosts based on visual cues,and the evolution of visual mimicry of host eggs or chicks by brood parasites.Hosts may also base rejection of brood parasite nestlings on vocal cues,which would in turn select for mimicry of host begging calls in brood parasite chicks.In cuckoos that exploit multiple hosts with different begging calls,call structure may be plastic,allowing nestlings to modify their calls to match those of their various hosts,or fixed,in which case we would predict either imperfect mimicry or divergence of the species into host-specific lineages.In our study of the little bronze-cuckoo(LBC)Chalcites minutillus and its primary host,the large-billed gerygone Gerygone magnirostris,we tested whether:(1)hosts use nestling vocalizations as a cue to discriminate cuckoo chicks;(2)cuckoo nestlings mimic the host begging calls throughout the nestling period;and(3)the cuckoo begging calls are plastic,thereby facilitating mimicry of the calls of different hosts.We found that the begging calls of LBCs are most similar to their gerygone hosts shortly after hatching(when rejection by hosts typically occurs)but become less similar as cuckoo chicks get older.Begging call structure may be used as a cue for rejection by hosts,and these results are consistent with gerygone defenses selecting for age-specific vocal mimicry in cuckoo chicks.We found no evidence that LBC begging calls were plastic.

关 键 词：begging call bronze-cuckoo brood parasitism coevolution gerygone 

分 类 号：Q95[生物学—动物学]