Color Preferences of Frugivorous Birds in Relation to the Colors of Fleshy Fruits

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Abstract
Aviary experiments demonstrated that three North American frugivorous migrant bird species often exhibit color preferences, when factors such as taste, nutrition, and accessibility to food sources are equal. Individual birds differed in initial color preferences, transitivity, and temporal stability of color preferences. There was little tendency of these birds to favor red and black, which are the most common colors of fruits of bird-dispersed plants, and a weak tendency to reject yellow. We suggest that avian color preferences may not provide strong selection favoring the evolution of the common fruit colors, and that the frequency distribution of fruit hues is best explained in other ways.