Sentence examples for conspicuous colouration from inspiring English sources

Prey species evolve a variety of ways to avoid their predators, including chemical toxins, camouflage, and conspicuous colouration.

"If I leaf through some of my field guides, it always strikes me how comparatively rare conspicuous colouration is", said Dr Rowland.

These results strongly support the escape-and-radiate hypothesis prediction that conspicuous colouration increases speciation and net diversification rates compared with camouflage and other forms of protective coloration.

"One other finding by Arbuckle and Speed might explain why: conspicuous colouration is a short-lived tactic, with animals either going extinct or reverting to crypsis frequently".

According to a study of amphibians published today in the journal, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, chemical defence and conspicuous colouration enhance speciation rates in prey species, as predicted.

Further, the speciation effects of chemical defence and of conspicuous coloration are independent from each other, so when a toxic species then evolves conspicuous colouration, the increased diversification rate that accompanies colouration may offset the reduced diversification rate conferred by chemical defence.

Conspicuous male colouration is expected to have evolved primarily through selection by female choice.

Further, the analysis showed that extinction rates were equal across all colouration strategies -- conspicuous, cryptic and polymorphic -- so the net diversification rate was higher overall for conspicuous amphibian species (Figure 2C).

Female preferences for male sexual signals are responsible for a spectacular array of phenotypic diversity found in the natural world, driving the evolution of exaggerated traits such as colouration [ 1], conspicuous ornaments [ 2, 3], and song [ 4, 5].

In contrast, however, dorsal fin colouration was far more conspicuous in females (compare the range of ΔR/G values in Figure  3C), but female dorsal fin colour did not appear to be influenced by predation.

Secondly, most species found to fluoresce are small, benthic, pair- or group-living fishes, often with conspicuous intra-specific behaviours, but quite cryptic colouration in other parts of the visible spectrum.