Parallel adaptations to nectarivory in parrots, key innovations and the diversification of the Loriinae

Ecology and Evolution

Manuel Schweizer²  Marcel Güntert²  Ole Seehausen³  Christoph Leuenberger¹ 

[1] Department of Quantitative Economics, University of Fribourg, Fribourg, Switzerland;Naturhistorisches Museum der Burgergemeinde Bern, Bern, Switzerland;Aquatic Ecology and Macroevolution, Institute of Ecology & Evolution, University of Bern, Bern, Switzerland

关键词: Comparative methods;    diet shift;    digestive tract;    evolutionary trait shifts;    morphological adaptations;   

DOI  :  10.1002/ece3.1131

来源: Wiley

【 摘 要 】

Abstract

Specialization to nectarivory is associated with radiations within different bird groups, including parrots. One of them, the Australasian lories, were shown to be unexpectedly species rich. Their shift to nectarivory may have created an ecological opportunity promoting species proliferation. Several morphological specializations of the feeding tract to nectarivory have been described for parrots. However, they have never been assessed in a quantitative framework considering phylogenetic nonindependence. Using a phylogenetic comparative approach with broad taxon sampling and 15 continuous characters of the digestive tract, we demonstrate that nectarivorous parrots differ in several traits from the remaining parrots. These trait-changes indicate phenotype–environment correlations and parallel evolution, and may reflect adaptations to feed effectively on nectar. Moreover, the diet shift was associated with significant trait shifts at the base of the radiation of the lories, as shown by an alternative statistical approach. Their diet shift might be considered as an evolutionary key innovation which promoted significant non-adaptive lineage diversification through allopatric partitioning of the same new niche. The lack of increased rates of cladogenesis in other nectarivorous parrots indicates that evolutionary innovations need not be associated one-to-one with diversification events.

【 授权许可】

CC BY   
© 2014 The Authors. Ecology and Evolution published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.