Posted on 09/29/2006 2:45:58 PM PDT by blam
Mums help chicks if dad was ugly
29 September 2006
From New Scientist Print Edition.
Evolution holds hope for ugly males. Females appear to invest extra energy in getting their poorer-quality offspring off to a good start, at least among house finches (Carpodacus mexicanus).
Female birds can deposit different amounts of health-promoting compounds in their eggs, depending on social and environmental conditions. Previous studies on zebra finches showed that females were more likely to invest in eggs fertilised by high-quality males.
Kristen Navara, now at Ohio State University in Columbus, expected to see the same pattern with house finches, in which red feathers are the hallmark of health. However, her measurements showed the opposite. Eggs from matings with less-attractive males, that is, those with drab plumage, contained 2.5 times more yolk antioxidants, including vitamin E and three carotenoids, which colour the plumage red. The study will appear in a future issue of Physiological and Biochemical Zoology.
(Excerpt) Read more at newscientist.com ...
This explains why my children are doted over by their mother...
I coulda told you that!
And I thought this was yet another ditsy chicks thread.
Health, merely attractiveness, or a combination of both?
Why does drab equate to unhealthiness? There must be some range of variation, even in healthy males?
And other animals will bite inferior offspring through the skull and consume them to provide more milk for the superior offspring. The moral? Be grateful if you're a finch.
Wouldn't it have been more efficient for the females just not to mate with ugly males.
I mean, what does she see in him?
If she would just not "put out" in the first place, then she would not have to put out all those extra ingredients.
Could it be that she was so ugly no other bird would have her, hmmmmmmm?
Ugly is a human concept. How do we know the scientist isn't anthropomorphizing?
I agree. I smell some very weak science here.
No, I'm drab and unhealthy. All my male friends who are drab are similarly unhealthy. All my healthy male friends are equally un-drab, without variation of any kind.
Momma House Finch says, "So what do I know from ugly?"
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