What is it about?

Scientists have long believed that crepuscular and nocturnal animals forgo visual signals and rely solely on sound and chemical communication, but many cases seem to indicate otherwise. White marks of feathers and fur on a dark background have the potential to be used to communicate with conspecifics in dim light at night in closed habitats, without alerting prey and predators. But what happens when the coat of individuals is entirely black, as in melanistic felids?

Featured Image

Why is it important?

The absence of white marks on the backs of ears of melanistic individual tends to be a limiting condition for intraspecific visual communication at night, resulting in an evolutionary dilemma for Felid species: to be almost invisible at night, but not to communicate visually. This influence important population processes and entailing selective advantages that may promote the ecological success of polymorphic species, but, so far, the absence of black feline species. This study showed for the first time the importance of visual communication under conditions of low lighting for the adaptive dynamics of melanism in felids, suggesting that white markings behind the ears have contributed to the evolutionary success of felids as nocturnal predators in forested environments.

Perspectives

The white color is conspicuous at night and in closed environments and is associated with intraspecific communication related to threat displays, alarm postures, and/or localization/orientation behaviors. We found an important relationship between visual communication and the occurrence of melanism in felids. Then, I hope this article opens new paths for research on the ecology and evolution of mammalian polymorphic coloration.

Maurício Graipel
Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina

Read the Original

This page is a summary of: Melanism evolution in the cat family is influenced by intraspecific communication under low visibility, PLoS ONE, December 2019, PLOS,
DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0226136.
You can read the full text:

Read
Open access logo

Contributors

The following have contributed to this page