Meeting Abstract
There is an astonishing diversity of animal signals, and often animals possess multiple signals. Selection will favor signals that can effectively be transmitted through the environment and detected by the receiver; and how multiple signals interact with each other and the environment during use can further influence signal efficacy. Angle-dependent, coloration often co-occurs with behavioral displays and can vary among species, providing an excellent model to study signal interactions. In these signaling systems, the environment and behavioral displays will interact directly with the angle-dependent structures to create the ornament’s appearance to the receiver (i.e. color appearance). We tested how interactions between these three factors produce variation in color appearance, and how micro- and nano-structures of angle-dependent ornaments covary among species with behavior, the environment, and color appearance. We tested these hypotheses in “bee” hummingbirds, as nearly all species in this tribe possess a variant of an angle-dependent ornamental throat patch and stereotyped courtship display. We found interspecific variation in feather structure/reflectance, display behaviors, solar-positional environment, and color appearance, and a negative co-evolutionary relationship between properties of the feathers and behaviors. We also found both positive and negative relationships between feather and behavioral properties with color appearance, illustrating the complex evolutionary relationships between these traits. By integrating the study of intricate behavioral displays, specific color production mechanisms, and environment, our results help improve our understanding the diversity of signals and their interactions.
