Examples
- Sam Brown and W. D. Hamilton and Marco Archetti proposed the idea that autumn leaf color is due to the trees signalling to aphids and other pest species that migrate to the trees in autumn. Autumn colour is costly to trees but bright trees might reduce their parasite load; aphids on the other hand might prefer trees with dull leaves because these are the ones with fewer chemical defenses. Indeed aphids appear to preferentially avoid trees with bright leaves and tree species with bright leaves have more specialist aphid pests than do trees lacking bright leaves. While autumn colours might be a real handicap, it is possible that the signal is not costly to produce. Autumn colours might instead be an "index", a signal that it kept honest by constraints rather than costs. The topic is still debated.
- Stotting for example in Thomson's Gazelles is cited as an example of signalling: the gazelles jump close to a predator instead of escaping, in what could be a signal of strength.
Read more about this topic: Signalling Theory
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