Singing Wings, Or Natural Selection's Lesser Known Sibling

Maybe the club-winged manakin's predecessor on the tree of life ate a cricket. Rather than being fully digested, some of the cricket's DNA was injected into the sperm factory. Miraculously a similar scenario took place in the female. Abracadabra, another tangle in the Tree of Life.

What I really love is Bostwick's prediction:

On her next trip to Ecuador, Dr. Bostwick hopes to catch a male club-winged manakin and clip off the raking tip on each wing (a harmless procedure).
"I should be able to completely silence the bird," she predicted.

Its like hypothesizing that if we cut off Keith Richards fingertips he won't be able to grind his axe...no brainer! Although Keith may be a bad example since after 40 years with the Stones he may not even have fingertips anymore!

Those curious, like me, shouldn't miss the video links available in the New York Times article. Pictures and PDFs are also available on Dr. Bostwick's webpage:

http://www.cumv.cornell.edu/staff/bostwick.html

And more manakin video clips are available here:

http://jeb.biologists.org/cgi/content/full/206/20/3693/DC1

Oh, and get well, Carl. I hope it's nothing too serious. Preferably something like wisdom teeth, where its no big deal and tailored for an evolutionary lesson as well. :)

I saw a report on tv a few months ago about these birds. It was part of a rainforest documentary on PBS.

Sexual selection may be "lesser known" in the world of textbooks and science writing. But most humans spend a good part of their lives more or less obsessively engaged in its strategies.

After all, once you zoom in below the population level, sexual selection is the primary filter for differential reproduction among animals. (Not to mention plants that use animals, e.g. pollinators that mistake flower parts for a mate.)

Did you see that our President is advocating "intelligent design" to be taught in our nation's classrooms? Unbelievable.