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. 2021 Sep 23;11(20):13773-13779.
doi: 10.1002/ece3.8041. eCollection 2021 Oct.

The color of greater flamingo feathers fades when no cosmetics are applied

Maria Cecilia Chiale  1   2 , Miguel A Rendón  3 , Sophie Labaude  4 , Anne-Sophie Deville  4 , Juan Garrido-Fernández  5 , Antonio Pérez-Gálvez  5 , Araceli Garrido  6 , Manuel Rendón-Martos  7 , Arnaud Béchet  4 , Juan A Amat  3
Affiliations

The color of greater flamingo feathers fades when no cosmetics are applied

Maria Cecilia Chiale et al. Ecol Evol. .

Abstract

Greater flamingos use cosmetic coloration by spreading uropygial secretions pigmented with carotenoids over their feathers, which makes the plumage redder. Because flamingos inhabit open environments that receive direct solar radiation during daytime, and carotenoids bleach when exposed to solar radiation, we expected that the plumage color would fade if there is no maintenance for cosmetic purposes. Here, we show that the concentrations of pigments inside feathers and on the surface of feathers were correlated, as well as that there was a correlation between the concentrations of pigments in the uropygial secretions and on the surface of feathers. There was fading in color (becoming less red) in feathers that received direct solar radiation when there was no plumage maintenance, but not so in others maintained in darkness. When we controlled for the initial color of feathers, the feathers of those individuals with higher concentration of pigments on the feather surfaces were those that lost less coloration after experimental exposure of feathers to sunny conditions. These results indicate that exposure to sunlight is correlated with the fading of feather color, which suggests that individuals need to regularly apply makeup to be more colorful. These results also reinforce the view that these birds use cosmetic coloration as a signal amplifier of plumage color. This may be important in species using highly variable habitats, such as wetlands, since the conditions experienced when molting may differ from those when the signal should be functional, usually months after molting.

Keywords: carotenoids; makeup; plumage coloration; signaling; uropygial secretions.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

Figures

FIGURE 1
FIGURE 1
The red coloration in neck and head feathers of greater flamingos results from the application by the birds themselves of uropygial secretions pigmented with carotenoids (photograph credit: Manuel Díaz Zurita)
FIGURE 2
FIGURE 2
Relationship between the redness of neck feathers from greater flamingos before the exposure of feathers to sunny conditions and the maintenance of feathers under conditions of darkness (n = 30 in each group). The redness values were obtained from the Commission International d'Eclairage (CIE) L*a*b* color space
FIGURE 3
FIGURE 3
Boxplots for redness values of neck feathers from greater flamingos. The feathers either received direct solar radiation or were in darkness (n = 30 in each group) during 40 days. The boxes represent the interquartile ranges (IQR: 25th and 75th percentiles), and the lines within the boxes are the medians. Whiskers extend 1.5 × IQR from the 75th and 25th percentiles. A dot denotes an outlier. The redness values were obtained from the Commission International d’Eclairage (CIE) L*a*b* color space
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