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285 results for “hummingbird”
Data from: Forest fragmentation and loss reduce richness, availability, and specialization in tropical hummingbird communities
Hummingbirds are important pollinators of many native Neotropical plants but their abundance and diversity in landscapes dominated by intensive human uses such as agriculture have rarely been examined, despite such land-uses prevailing in the tropics. We examined how tropical deforestation affects hummingbird community structure in premontane forest patches embedded in a tropical countryside of Coto Brus Canton, Costa Rica. We captured hummingbirds in fourteen landscapes representing a gradient in patch size and forest amount, and tested for the effects of these variables on (1) hummingbird captures at flowers (pollinator availability); (2) species richness; and (3) filtering of functional traits. After accounting for sampling effects, both hummingbird availability and species richness declined by 40% and 50%, respectively, across the gradient in deforestation that we observed (9–66% forest within 1000 m). Focal patch size was the strongest predictor, even after statistically accounting for the amount of forest and matrix composition of landscapes. These reductions in availability and richness were well predicted by functional traits; morphologically specialized species with the capacity to transport long-distance outcrossed pollen and low functional redundancy within the pollinator network showed the greatest sensitivity to landscape change. We hypothesize that declines in hummingbird availability, diversity, and functional traits are important mechanisms driving the observed pollen limitation of ornithophilous flowers in fragmented tropical landscapes. Efforts to conserve large forest patches and enhance matrix permeability are critical for maintaining forest hummingbird communities and pollination services under current and predicted deforestation regimes.
Data from: Adaptation to hummingbird pollination is associated with reduced diversification in Penstemon
A striking characteristic of the Western North American flora is the repeated evolution of hummingbird pollination from insect-pollinated ancestors. This pattern has received extensive attention as an opportunity to study repeated trait evolution as well as potential constraints on evolutionary reversibility, with little attention focused on the impact of these transitions on species diversification rates. Yet traits conferring adaptation to divergent pollinators potentially impact speciation and extinction rates, since pollinators facilitate plant reproduction and specify mating patterns between flowering plants. Here we examine macroevolutionary processes affecting floral pollination syndrome diversity in the largest North American genus of flowering plants, Penstemon. Within Penstemon, transitions from ancestral bee-adapted flowers to hummingbird-adapted flowers have frequently occurred, although hummingbird-adapted species are rare overall within the genus. We inferred macroevolutionary transition and state-dependent diversification rates and found that transitions from ancestral bee-adapted flowers to hummingbird-adapted flowers are associated with reduced net diversification rate, a finding based on an estimated 17 origins of hummingbird pollination in our sample. While this finding is congruent with hypotheses that hummingbird adaptation in North American Flora is associated with reduced species diversification rates, it contrasts with studies of neotropical plant families where hummingbird pollination has been associated with increased species diversification. We further used the estimated macroevolutionary rates to predict the expected pattern of floral diversity within Penstemon over time, assuming stable diversification and transition rates. Under these assumptions, we find that hummingbird-adapted species are expected to remain rare, due to their reduced diversification rates. In fact, current floral diversity in the sampled Penstemon lineage, where less than one-fifth of species are hummingbird-adapted, is consistent with predicted levels of diversity under stable macroevolutionary rates.
An unusual amino acid substitution within hummingbird cytochrome c oxidase alters a key proton-conducting channel
<p>Hummingbirds in flight exhibit the highest metabolic rate of all vertebrates. The bioenergetic requirements associated with sustained hovering flight raise the possibility of unique amino acid substitutions that would enhance aerobic metabolism. Here, we have identified a non-conservative substitution within the mitochondria-encoded cytochrome <i>c</i> oxidase subunit I (COI) that is fixed within hummingbirds, yet exceedingly rare among other vertebrates. This unusual change is also rare among metazoans, but can be identified in several clades with diverse life histories. We performed atomistic molecular dynamics simulations using bovine and hummingbird COI models, thereby bypassing experimental limitations imposed by the inability to modify mtDNA in a site-specific manner. Intriguingly, our findings suggest that COI amino acid position 153 (bovine numbering system) provides control over the hydration and activity of a key proton channel in COX. We discuss potential phenotypic outcomes linked to this intriguing alteration encoded by the hummingbird mitochondrial genome.</p>
Data from: Ecological release of the Anna's Hummingbird during a northern range expansion
During range expansions species can experience rapid population growth if changes in climate or interspecific interactions remove limits on growth rates in novel habitats. Here I document a century of range expansion in the Anna's Hummingbird (Calypte anna) and investigate the causes of its recent abundance through a combination of demographic, climatic, and phenological analyses. Christmas Bird Count records show that populations have been growing within the native range since the early twentieth century. Sites across the Pacific Northwest show striking fits to simple models of exponential growth following colonization in the 1960's and 70's, and nest records indicate that the species now delays the start of the nesting season by at least 16 days in the north. Although the species now occurs in a much wider range of climates than it did in its native range, the fastest growing sites in the northwest are in regions with minimum breeding season temperatures similar to those occupied by the species prior to the expansion. Range expansions in the Anna's Hummingbird thus reflect an ecological release likely caused by a mix of human facilitation, introduced plants, and phenological acclimation that allowed a California native to expand across western North America.
Data from: Floral antagonists counteract pollinator-mediated selection on attractiveness traits in the hummingbird-pollinated Collaea cipoensis (Fabaceae)
Pollinator-mediated selection towards larger and abundant flowers is common in naturally pollen-limited populations. However, floral antagonists may counteract this effect, maintaining smaller- and few-flowered individuals within populations. We quantified pollinator and antagonist visit rates and determined a multiplicative female fitness component from attacked and non-attacked flowers of the Brazilian hummingbird-pollinated shrub Collaea cipoensis to determine the selective effects of pollinators and floral antagonists on flower size and number. We predicted that floral antagonists reduce the female fitness component and thus exert negative selective pressures on flower size and number, counteracting the positive effects of pollinators. Pollinators, mainly hummingbirds, comprised 4% of total floral visitation, whereas antagonist ants and bees accounted for 90% of visitation. Nectar-robbers involved about 99% of floral antagonist visit rates, whereas florivores comprised the remaining 1%. Larger and abundant flowers increased both pollinator and antagonist visit rates and the female fitness component significantly decreased in flowers attacked by nectar-robbers and florivores in comparison to non-attacked flowers. We detected that pollinators favored larger- and many-flowered individuals, whereas floral antagonists exerted negative selection on flower size and number. This study confirms that floral antagonists reduce female plant fitness and this pattern directly exerts negative selective pressures on flower size and number, counteracting pollinator-mediated selection on floral attractiveness traits.
Hummingbird torpor in context: duration, more than temperature, is the key to nighttime energy savings
Torpor is an important energy saving strategy in some small birds, but it has rarely been studied in natural field conditions. We compared torpor use across 43 wild-caught individuals of eight hummingbird species across sites with different natural temperature regimes. Most laboratory studies focus on the relationship between metabolic rate and temperature, but our aim was to evaluate what environmental factors most influence hummingbird nighttime energy management under natural conditions. We found that the probability of an individual entering torpor was weakly correlated with mass but unrelated to nighttime temperature and that hummingbirds at both warm, tropical and cooler, temperate sites used torpor. Energy savings in torpor were maximized as ambient temperatures approached a species' minimum body temperature, consistent with laboratory studies; energy savings ranged between 65-92% of energy per hour in torpor compared to normothermy. However, regardless of the degree of energy savings in torpor, variation in total nighttime energy expenditure was most significantly influenced by torpor bout duration. Lab studies largely assess the effect of temperature on torpor use, but our findings indicate that other environmental conditions are more important in determining hummingbirds' total nighttime energy expenditure under natural temperature cycles. Our results show that a small endotherm's nighttime energy management in its natural habitat is more affected by torpor bout duration, which is linked to photoperiod, than by temperature. This result suggests that in their natural environments hummingbirds are able to save energy in torpor across a range of nighttime temperatures, indicating that they may have sufficient physiological flexibility to tolerate climatic variation.
Ecological mechanisms explaining interactions within plant-hummingbird networks: morphological matching increases towards lower latitudes
<p><a name="ab4">Interactions between species are influenced by different ecological mechanisms, such as morphological matching, phenological overlap, and species abundances</a>. <a name="Ab1"></a><a name="ab5">How</a> these mechanisms explain interaction frequencies across environmental gradients remains poorly understood. Consequently, we also know little about the mechanisms that drive the geographical patterns in network structure, such as complementary specialization and modularity. Here, we use data on morphologies, phenologies and abundances to explain interaction frequencies between hummingbirds and plants at a large geographic scale. <a name="ab2">For 24 quantitative networks sampled throughout the Americas, we found that</a> the tendency of species to interact with morphologically matching partners contributed to specialized and modular network structures. Morphological matching best explained interaction frequencies in networks found closer to the equator and in areas with low temperature seasonality. When comparing the three ecological mechanisms within networks, we found that both morphological matching and phenological overlap generally outperformed abundances in the explanation of interaction frequencies. Together, these findings provide insights into the ecological mechanisms that underlie geographical patterns in resource specialization. Notably, our results highlight morphological constraints on interactions as a potential explanation for increasing resource specialization towards lower latitudes.</p>
Citizen science data reveals altitudinal movement and seasonal ecosystem use by hummingbirds in the Andes Mountains
Ensuring connectivity is crucial to protect landscapes but it requires knowledge about how animals use ecosystems throughout the year. However, animal movements remain largely unknown in biodiversity hotspots, even for species that fulfill key ecological roles, as is the case of hummingbirds in the Andes. In the complex topography of mountain slopes, movement of these avian pollinators may occur either between habitat patches with asynchronous plant blooms or across ecosystems that are located within same elevation bands or along altitudinal gradients. Here, we used two decades (2000-2020) of records from citizen science data and boosted regression trees to predict monthly distributions for 55 hummingbird species in the Andes. We identified shifts in altitudinal distribution between contiguous months and calculated changes in the proportion of predicted distributions occupied by ecosystem types. Our findings reveal substantial altitudinal movement and differences in the proportion of ecosystem types utilized throughout the year that had not been previously reported for several species. Yet the magnitude of altitudinal and ecosystem shifts varies between hummingbird clades, and in some cases changes in the proportion of ecosystem types within estimated distributions occurs with little variation in altitude. All ecosystems across the Andes show temporal changes in hummingbird occurrence, but these are higher in natural landscapes compared to croplands or urban areas. Finally, we used phylogenetic logistic regression to test whether altitudinal and ecosystem shifts affect population trends. We found that higher ecosystem seasonality is more strongly associated with decreasing populations in comparison to altitudinal shifts. Altogether, our study reveals complex patterns of movement in hummingbirds and highlights the importance of ecological connectivity across different ecosystem types. More generally, it demonstrates the opportunity of using citizen science data to increase understanding about species' seasonal occurrences so that landscapes can be better managed to protect animal movement.
Data associated with: A phylogenetic perspective on ecological specialisation reveals hummingbird and insect pollinators have generalist diets
<p>Specialisation in food resource use is a crucial process that fosters species coexistence in plant-animal networks, contributing to the maintenance of biodiversity, ecological complexity, and community stability. Notably, although there is a vast literature on ecological specialisation in pollination systems, the evolutionary similarity among the plant species visited by particular pollinators has been largely ignored. Here, we apply a robust phylogenetic approach to analyse whether the evolutionary relatedness of plant species is a significant factor in mediating pollinator visits and how it relates to the morphology of interacting species. We quantified ecological and clade specialisation of hummingbird and insect species in three mutualistic networks from the Costa Rican highlands and associated these metrics with species traits. We found that hummingbirds were overall ecologically more specialised than insects (i.e. visited a less diverse set of plant species). However, when evaluating the phylogenetic relatedness among the visited plant species, all hummingbird species and most insects had overdispersed diets, which indicates they visited phylogenetically distant plant species in the community. Moreover, a great proportion of these clade generalists visited plant species with a great variation in corolla length, showing a lack of preference for this morphological trait. Altogether, our results demonstrate that by incorporating plant phylogeny to network analysis, pollinator species were generalists and that corolla length weakly influences plant-pollinator interactions in the three studied networks. A phylogenetic perspective should occupy a central role in the study of specialisation since it contributes to understanding the interplay between ecological and evolutionary processes in mutualistic networks. Future research should focus on evaluating whether the phylogenetic structure of animal diets mediates patterns of interactions in different types of mutualisms and environmental contexts, linking these patterns to other floral traits. This knowledge may be valuable for deepening our comprehension of the underlying mechanisms shaping ecological networks.</p>
Vocal dimorphism in Anna's Hummingbirds
<p>Sexual dimorphism in vocal signals is found across many bird species. By evaluating correlations among sex, behaviors, and vocalizations, the meaning and utility of sound production may be inferred. Anna's Hummingbirds (<em>Calypte anna</em>) exhibit pronounced sexual dimorphism, with males being larger and having more vibrant coloration than females, but vocal dimorphism in the species is less studied. A common vocalization of Anna's Hummingbirds is the chip note, which is produced by both sexes in a wide array of contexts. Here, we correlated temporal parameters of recorded chip notes with individual sex and behavioral contexts gathered from field observations. The production rate of chip notes differed significantly between male and female hummingbirds but did not vary much with behavioral context. Although Anna's Hummingbirds produce chips across a broad spectrum of behaviors, dimorphic chip production may be especially important in territorial behavior.</p>
Stigma shape shifting in sages (Salvia: Lamiaceae) – hummingbirds guided the evolution of New World floral features
<p><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span><span>A fundamental question in evolutionary biology is how clades of organisms exert influence on one another. The evolution of the flower and subsequent plant/pollinator coevolution are major innovations that have operated in flowering plants to promote species radiations at a variety of taxonomic levels in the Neotropics. Here we test the hypothesis that pollination by Neotropical endemic hummingbirds drove the evolution of two unique stigma traits in correlation with other floral traits in New World Salvia (Lamiaceae). We examined morphometric shapes of stigma lobing across 400 Salvia spp., scored presence and absence of a stigma brush across Salvia, and used a suite of phylogenetic comparative methods to detect shape regime shifts, correlation of trait shifts with BayesTraits and phylogenetic generalized least square regressions, and the influence of scored pollinators on trait evolution using OUwie. We found that a major Neotropical clade of Salvia evolved a correlated set of stigma features, with a longer upper stigma lobe and stigmatic brush, following an early shift to hummingbird pollination. Evolutionary constraint is evident as subsequent shifts to bee pollination largely retained these two features. Our results support the hypothesis that hummingbirds guided the correlative shifts in corolla, anther connective, style and stigma shape in Neotropical Salvia, despite repeated shifts back to bee pollination. </span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></p>
A heterothermic spectrum in hummingbirds
<p>Many small endotherms use torpor, saving energy by a controlled reduction of their body temperature and metabolic rate. Some species (e.g. arctic ground squirrels, hummingbirds) enter deep torpor, dropping their body temperatures by 23-37 &[deg]C, while others can only enter shallow torpor (e.g., pigeons, 3-10 &[deg]C reductions). However, deep torpor in mammals can increase predation risk (unless animals are in burrows or caves), inhibit immune function, and result in sleep deprivation, so even for species that can enter deep torpor, facultative shallow torpor might help balance energy savings with these potential costs. Deep torpor occurs in three avian orders. Although the literature hints that some bird species can use both shallow and deep torpor, little empirical evidence of such an avian torpor spectrum exists. We infrared imaged three hummingbird species that are known to use deep torpor, under natural temperature and light cycles, to test if they were also capable of shallow torpor. All three species used both deep and shallow torpor, often on the same night. Depending on the species, they used shallow torpor for 5-35% of the night. The presence of a bird torpor spectrum indicates a capacity for fine-scale physiological and genetic regulation of avian torpid metabolism.</p>
Anna's hummingbird (Calypte anna) physiological response to novel thermal and hypoxic conditions at high elevations
<p>Many species have not tracked their thermal niches upslope as predicted by climate change, potentially because higher elevations are associated with abiotic challenges beyond temperature. To better predict if organisms can continue to move upslope with rising temperatures, we need to understand their physiological performance when subjected to novel high elevation conditions. Here, we captured Anna's hummingbirds – a species expanding their elevational distribution in concordance with rising temperatures – from across their current elevational distribution and tested their physiological response to novel abiotic conditions. First, at a central aviary within their current elevational range, we measured hovering metabolic rate to assess their response to oxygen conditions and torpor use to assess their response to thermal conditions. Second, we transported the hummingbirds to a location 1200 meters above their current elevational range limit to test an acute response to novel oxygen and thermal conditions. Hummingbirds exhibited lower hovering metabolic rates above their current elevational range limit, suggesting lower oxygen availability may reduce performance after an acute exposure. Alternatively, hummingbirds showed a facultative response to thermal conditions by using torpor more frequently and longer. Finally, post-experimental dissection found that hummingbirds originating from higher elevations within their range had larger hearts, a potential plastic response to hypoxic environments. Overall, our results suggest lower oxygen availability and low air pressure may be difficult challenges to overcome for hummingbirds shifting upslope due to rising temperatures, especially if there is little to no long-term acclimatization. Future studies should investigate how chronic exposure and acclimatization to novel conditions, as opposed to acute experiments, may result in alternative outcomes that help organisms better respond to abiotic challenges associated climate-induced range shifts.</p>
Behavioural and morphological traits influence sex-specific floral resource use by hummingbirds
<p>Research on resource partitioning in plant-pollinator mutualistic systems is mainly concentrated at the levels of species and communities, whereas differences between males and females are typically ignored. Nevertheless, pollinators often show large sexual differences in behaviour and morphology, which may lead to sex-specific patterns of resource use with the potential to differentially affect plant reproduction and diversification. We investigated variation in behavioural and morphological traits between sexes of hummingbird species as potential mechanisms underlying sex-specific flower resource use in ecological communities. To do so, we compiled a dataset of plant-hummingbird interactions based on pollen loads for 31 hummingbird species from 13 localities across the Americas, complemented by data on territorial behaviour (territorial or nonterritorial) and morphological traits (bill length, bill curvature, wing length and body mass). We assessed the extent of intersexual differences in niche breadth and niche overlap in floral resource use across hummingbird species. Then, we tested whether floral niche breadth and overlap between sexes are associated with sexual dimorphism in behavioural or morphological traits of hummingbird species, while accounting for evolutionary relatedness among the species. We found striking differences in patterns of floral resource use between sex. Females had a broader floral niche breadth and were more dissimilar in the plant species visited with respect to males of the same species, resulting in a high level of resource partitioning between sexes. We found that both territoriality and morphological traits were related to sex-specific resource use by hummingbird species. Notably, niche overlap between sexes was greater for territorial than nonterritorial species, and moreover, niche overlap was negatively associated with sexual dimorphism in bill curvature across hummingbird species. These results reveal the importance of behavioural and morphological traits of hummingbird species in sex-specific resource use and that resource partitioning by sex is likely to be an important mechanism to reduce intersexual competition in hummingbirds. These findings highlight the need for better understanding the putative role of intersexual variation in shaping patterns of interactions and plant reproduction in ecological communities.</p>
Early stages of speciation with gene flow in the Amazilia Hummingbird (Amazilis amazilia) subspecies complex of Western South America
<p>Disentangling the factors underlying the diversification of geographically variable species with a wide geographical range is essential to understanding the initial stages and drivers of the speciation process. The Amazilia Hummingbird, <em>Amazilis amazilia</em>, is found along the Pacific coast from northern Ecuador down to the Nazca Valley of Peru, and is currently classified as six phenotypically differentiated subspecies. Our aims were to resolve the evolutionary relationships of the six subspecies, to assess the geographical pattern and extent of evolutionary divergence, and to test for introgression using both a mtDNA marker and a genome-by-sequencing dataset from 86 individuals from across the species range. The consensus phylogenetic tree separated the six subspecies into three distinct clades, corresponding with the Ecuador lowlands (<em>A. amazilia dumerilii</em>), the Ecuador highlands (<em>A. amazilia alticola</em> and <em>A. amazilia azuay</em>), and the Peruvian coast (<em>A. amazilia leucophoea</em>, <em>A. amazilia amazilia</em>, and <em>A. amazilia caeruleigularis</em>). However, an unresolved mtDNA network suggests that the diversification of the subspecies was recent and rapid. We found evidence of gene flow among the subspecies <em>A. amazilia dumerilii</em>, <em>A. amazilia alticola</em>, and <em>A. amazilia leucophoea</em>, with strong genetic isolation of the subspecies <em>A. amazilia azuay</em> in the isolated Yunguilla Valley of Ecuador. Finally, environmental data from each subspecies' capture locations were concordant with the three distinct clades. Overall, our results suggest that both expansion into new habitats and geographic isolation shaped the present-day phylogeny and range of the <em>A. amazilia</em> subspecies, and that <em>A. amazilia azuay </em>may be genetically divergent enough to be considered a separate species.</p>
Data for: Elevated inbreeding in Heliconia tortuosa is determined by tropical forest stand age, isolation, and loss of hummingbird functional diversity
<p>Forest conversion and habitat loss are major threats to biological diversity. Forest regeneration can mitigate the negative effects of old growth forest loss on species diversity, but less is known about the extent to which forest loss reduces genetic diversity in remnant populations and whether secondary forests play a role in the maintenance of genetic diversity. We quantified genetic diversity in a tropical hummingbird-pollinated understory herb, <em>Heliconia tortuosa</em>, across a landscape mosaic of primary and secondary forest regrowth. Using microsatellite genotypes from >850 adult and juvenile plants within 33 forest patches and extensive bird surveys, we examined the effect of contemporary and historical landscape features including forest age (primary vs. secondary forest), stand isolation, and pollinator assemblages on genetic diversity and levels of inbreeding in <em>H. tortuosa</em>. We found that inbreeding was up to 3x higher in secondary forest, and this effect was amplified with reductions in primary forest in the surrounding landscape through reduced observed heterozygosity in isolated fragments. Inbreeding in forest patches was negatively correlated with the local frequency of specialist long-distance foraging traplining hummingbirds. Traplining hummingbirds therefore appear to facilitate mating among unrelated plants - an inference we tested using empirically parameterized simulations. Higher levels of inbreeding in <em>H. tortuosa</em> are therefore associated with reduced functional diversity of hummingbirds in secondary forests and forest patches isolated from primary forests. Our findings suggest a cryptic consequence of primary forest loss and secondary forest regeneration through the disruption of mutualistic interactions resulting in the erosion of genetic diversity in a common understory plant.</p>
Intersexual social dominance mimicry drives female hummingbird polymorphism DATA_CODE
<p>Contains all relevant data and code for analyses and figures used in "Intersexual social dominance mimicry drives female hummingbird polymorphism" by Jay J. Falk, Dustin R. Rubenstein, Alejandro Rico-Guevara, Michael S. Webster. Proceedings of the Royal Society B, 2022. </p>
Ecuadorian Plant-Hummingbird interactions over an elevation gradient in the Andes, sampled with camera traps in 11 localities
<p class="MsoNormal"><span>Community ecologists have made great advances in understanding how natural communities can be both diverse and stable by studying communities as interaction networks. However, focus has been on interaction networks aggregated over time, neglecting the consequences of the seasonal organization of interactions, henceforth seasonal structure, for community stability. Here, we extended previous theoretical findings on the topic in two ways: (i) by integrating empirical seasonal structure of 11 plant-hummingbird communities into dynamic models, and (ii) by tackling multiple facets of network stability together. We show that, in a competition context, seasonal structure enhances community stability by allowing diverse and resilient communities while preserving their robustness to species extinctions. The positive effects of empirical seasonal structure on network stability vanished when using randomized seasonal structures, suggesting that eco-evolutionary dynamics produce stabilizing seasonal structures. We also show that the effects of seasonal structure on community stability are mainly mediated by changes in network structure and productivity, suggesting that the seasonal structure of a community is an important and yet neglected aspect in the diversity-stability and diversity-productivity debates.</span></p>
Hummingbirds rapidly respond to the removal of visible light and control a sequence of rate-commanded escape maneuvers in milliseconds
<p>Hummingbirds routinely execute a variety of stunning aerobatic feats, which continue to challenge current notions of aerial agility and controlled stability in biological systems. Indeed, the control of these amazing maneuvers is not well understood. Here we examined how hummingbirds control a sequence of maneuvers within milliseconds and tested whether and when they use vision during this rapid process. We repeatedly elicited escape flights in Calliope hummingbirds and removed visible light during each maneuver at various instants and quantified their flight kinematics and responses. We show that the escape maneuvers were composed of rapidly-controlled sequential modules including evasion, reorientation, nose-down dive, forward flight, and nose-up to hover. The hummingbirds did not respond to the light removal during evasion and reorientation until a critical light-removal time; afterward, they showed two categories of luminance-based responses that rapidly altered maneuvering modules to terminate the escape. We also show that hummingbird maneuvers were rate-commanded and required no active braking, i.e., their body angular velocities were proportional to the change of wing motion patterns, a trait that likely alleviates the computational demand on flight control. This work uncovers key traits of hummingbird agility, which can also inform and inspire designs for next-generation agile aerial systems.</p>
Data from: Two ways to display: male hummingbirds show different color-display tactics based on sun orientation
Animals exhibit a diversity of ornaments and courtship behaviors, which often co-occur and are used for communication. The sensory drive hypothesis states that these traits evolved and vary due to interactions with each other, the environment, and signal receiver. However, interactions between colorful ornaments and courtship behaviors, specifically in relation to environmental variation, remain poorly understood. We studied male iridescent plumage (gorgets), display behavior, and sun orientation during courtship flights (shuttle displays) in broad-tailed hummingbirds (Selasphorus platycercus), to understand how these traits interact in both space and time to produce the perceived coloration of males. We also tested how gorget coloration varies among males based on their plumage, behavioral, and morphological characteristics. In contrast with previous work on other animals, we found that displaying males did not directionally face the sun, but instead displayed on a continuum of solar orientation angles. The gorgets of males who tended to face the sun during their displays appeared flashier (i.e. exhibited greater color/brightness changes), brighter, and more colorful, whereas the gorgets of males who tended to not face the sun were more consistently reflective (i.e. little color change) and had greater UV reflectance. We found that males who produced consistent colors had larger gorgets, whereas males with flashier gorgets were better able to maintain their angles of orientation towards the female. Our study illustrates how visual traits interact in complex ways with each other and the environment and how males of the same species can use multiple tactics to dynamically display their coloration.
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Allen Brain Atlas
Allen Brain Atlas is an Allen Institute collection of brain map atlases, datasets, APIs, and analysis tools covering mouse, human, and non-human primate brain resources.
Annotated Behaviour and Observability Dataset (ABODe)
ABODe is a University of Edinburgh DataShare dataset for behavior classification in group-housed mice using home-cage video, identities, bounding boxes, ground-plate positions, and annotator labels.
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