MALE spotless starlings care more for chicks that hatch from darker eggs than from paler eggs, suggesting they may use egg colour as an indicator of the mother’s fitness.
José Javier Cuervo of the Spanish National Research Council unit in AlmerÃa and his team clipped a few feathers from 33 female spotless starlings, reducing their wingspan by 5 per cent. These females then had to expend more energy when flying to seek food. The eggs produced by these females were lighter in colour than those produced by their unclipped counterparts, and also lighter than those of females whose feathers had…
