Sexual Selection and the Barn Swallow

ISBN-13: 9780198540281 / Angielski / Miękka / 1994 / 376 str.

Anders P. Moller; A. P. Mller; Jens Gregersen

Opis

This informative book details the important effects sexual selection has on barn swallow mating behavior, mating competition, parental care, host-parasite interactions, and migration strategies. The first two chapters present a concise, insightful review of the two main components of sexual selection theory--male-male competition and female choice. Citing evidence from the author's long-term field work on the monogamous barn swallow, subsequent chapters investigate the advantages held by males with colorful plumage and by females who are choosy when selecting a mating partner. In his exploration of the roles of behavior, ecology, morphology, genetics, and evolution, Moller provides an invaluable synthesis of barn swallow mating behavior research. Students and researchers of ecology, animal behavior, ornithology, and evolutionary biology will welcome this book.
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Recenzje

Anders Moller's excellent book illustrates very strikingly both the value of sustained study of a single species and the way in which a sound understanding of theory can give direction and purpose to such work.Moller presents both an elegant treatise on the subject of sexual selection and a book that is highly readable and informative and which provides much more than an exhaustive reading of his many papers ever could...lucid, enthralling and stimulating book...This is a splendidly produced and well-illustrated book (the drawings by Jens Gregersen are delightful) that I recommend whole-heartedly. Indeed, as an exmplar of sound methodology and of the use of theory to direct observations and experiments, it should be compulsory reading for all students about to embark on research in behavioural ecology.