As an outcome of decades of research on visual aposematic signals we currently understand relatively well the mechanisms involved in the avoidance learning processes. Warning signals protect aposematic prey from predation mainly by facilitating predator learning to avoid the aposematic prey ( Ruxton et al., 2004 Stevens and Ruxton, 2012). Our results open new directions of research by highlighting the possibility that similar facilitation effects may contribute to the evolution of various forms of post-attack visual displays in chemically, or otherwise, defended animals.Īposematism comprises a situation when defended prey advertise their unpalatability to the predators by using conspicuous warning signals. However, the support for the aposematic signaling hypothesis was equivocal. We found that predators learned to avoid attacking the prey which supports the facilitation hypothesis. Second, we tested whether the display facilitates the memory formation between cryptic visible form of the prey and prey defense so that it prevents the predators initiate an attack upon seeing the cryptic form (facilitation hypothesis). First, we tested whether the display increases the rejection of the prey by predators upon seeing the display (i.e., at the moment of attack) through learning trials (aposematic signaling hypothesis). We examined two adaptive hypotheses on this facultative aposematic display using wild-caught oriental tits ( Parus minor) as predators. The function of those displays in unpalatable insects is not well understood. But a variety of chemically defended insects are rather cryptic when resting, and only in response to predator attacks (post-attack) they perform displays of conspicuous abdomens or hindwings normally hidden under forewings. Most of the research have focused on visual aposematic signals that are constantly presented and visible to the predators. Warning signals protect unpalatable prey from predation because predators who learn the association between the warning signal and prey unprofitability decrease attacks on the prey. 4Museum and Institutue of Zoology, Polish Academy of Sciences, Warsaw, Poland.3Institute of Advanced Machinery and Design, Seoul National University, Seoul, South Korea.2Department of Biology, Carleton University, Ottawa, ON, Canada.1School of Biological Sciences, Seoul National University, Seoul, South Korea. Changku Kang 1,2 Hyun-Joon Cho 1 Sang-Im Lee 1,3 Piotr G.
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