Egg recognition abilities of tit species in the Paridae family: do Indomalayan tits exhibit higher recognition than Palearctic tits?

Abstract

Recent studies have shown that the closely related cinereous tit (Parus cinereus) and green-backed tit (P. monticolus) in China display strong egg recognition ability in contrast to tit species in Europe, which lack such ability. However, egg recognition in other populations of cinereous and green-backed tits and additional Paridae species still requires further research. Here, we compared the egg recognition abilities of cinereous tits across China, green-backed tits (P. m. insperatus) in Taiwan, China, and five other species from the Paridae family, including the marsh tit (Poecile palustris), varied tit (Sittiparus varius), willow tit (Poecile montanus), coal tit (Periparus ater), and ground tit (Pseudopodoces humilis). Results showed that the Hebei (58.8% egg rejection, n=17) and Liaoning populations (53.3%, n=15) of cinereous tits, and the Guizhou (100%, n=12) and Taiwan populations (75%, n=12) of green-backed tits all exhibited high egg recognition ability. The egg recognition ability of these tits was significantly greater than that of the other five species in the Paridae family. The varied tit (5.4%, n=37), marsh tit (8.3%, n=12), willow tit (Hebei: 25%, n=20; Beijing: 9.5%, n=21), coal tit (16.7%, n=18), and ground tit (0, n=5) species all showed low egg recognition abilities, with no significant differences found among them. Egg recognition was not associated with a single phylogenetic group but occurred in several groups of tits. In particular, those species widely distributed in the Indomalayan realm, thus overlapping with small cuckoo species, displayed strong egg recognition ability, whereas tit species in the Palearctic realm exhibited low or no egg recognition ability.