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Telomeres are protective, nucleoprotein structures at the end of chromosomes that have been associated with lifespan across taxa. However, the extent to which these associations can be attributed to absolute length vs. the rate of telomere shortening prior to sampling remains unresolved. In a longitudinal study, we examined the relationship between lifespan, telomere length and the rate of telomere shortening in wild, purple-crowned fairy-wrens (Malurus coronatus coronatus). To this end, we measured telomere length using quantitative polymerase chain reaction in the blood of 59 individuals sampled as nestlings and 4-14 months thereafter, and in 141 known-age individuals sampled on average three times across adulthood. We applied within-subject centring analyses to simultaneously test for associations between lifespan and average telomere length and telomere shortening. We reveal that the rate of telomere shortening and to a lesser extent telomere length in the first year of life independently predicted lifespan, with individuals with faster shortening rates and/or shorter telomeres living less long. In contrast, in adulthood neither telomere shortening nor telomere length predicted lifespan, despite a considerably larger data set. Our results suggest that telomere length measured very early in life (during development) and longitudinal assessments of telomere shortening during the first year of life constitute more useful biomarkers of total life expectancy than either telomere length measured after development, or telomere shortening later in adulthood.

Recent evidence suggests that female ornaments can commonly act as signals. However, how signaling functions might be affected by the tendency for reduced ornament elaboration in relation to males is less well-understood. We address this in mutually ornamented purple-crowned fairy-wrens. We investigated putatively ornamental (tail, ear coverts, crown) and non-ornamental (throat, back) plumage patches in females and compared our findings to previous studies in males. Both sexes have brown backs, buff-white throats, and turquoise-blue tails (bluer in males), while ear coverts are rufous in females and black in males. Both sexes also have a seasonal crown (slate-gray in females, black-and-purple in males). Dominant (breeder) females expressed more complete and grayer (more ornamented) crowns, although variation in coloration should not be discriminable by individuals. Unexpectedly, subordinates showed more colorful (saturated) rufous ear coverts, which should be discriminable. Condition-dependence was only evident for crown completeness (% slate-gray cover). Females with more reddish-brown backs were more reproductively successful. Variation in plumage characteristics did not explain differential allocation by mates or chances of gaining dominance. Our outcomes were not entirely consistent with findings in males. The most notable disparity was for the crown, a signal used in male-male competition that in females seems to be expressed as an incomplete version of the male crown that is not associated with fitness benefits. Our study shows that in a species, multiple traits can vary in their information content and that female ornaments can sometimes be less informative than in males, even those that are produced seasonally.

Sexual ornaments are often considered honest signals of quality because potential costs or constraints prevent their display by low-quality individuals. Testing for potential physiological costs of ornaments is difficult, as this requires experimentally forcing individuals to produce and display elaborate ornaments. We use this approach to test whether a sexually selected trait is physiologically costly to male superb fairy-wrens (Malurus cyaneus). Male fairy-wrens molt from brown to blue breeding plumage at different times of the year, and females strongly prefer the few males that are blue early, during winter. We used short-acting testosterone implants to stimulate males to produce “early-blue” plumage and assessed costs during and after molt using a panel of physiological indices. Testosterone-implanted, T-males molted in winter and produced blue plumage 6 weeks before control-implanted, C-males. T-males molted while in lower body condition, tended to have lower fat reserves, and were more likely to be parasitized by lice. However, we detected no negative effects on immune function, blood parasites, exposure to stressors, or survival. Juvenile males never naturally display early-blue plumage, but we found no evidence for increased costs paid by juvenile T-males. Instead, juvenile T-males molted later than adult T-males, suggesting that age presents an absolute constraint on ornament exaggeration that cannot be fully overcome by testosterone treatment. Together, these small costs and large, age-related constraints may enforce signal honesty, and explain female preference for early-blue males.

Telomere length (TL) shortens with age but telomere dynamics can relate to fitness components independent of age. Immune function often relates to such fitness components and can also interact with telomeres. Studying the link between TL and immune function may therefore help us understand telomere–fitness associations. We assessed the relationships between erythrocyte TL and four immune indices (haptoglobin, natural antibodies (NAbs), complement activity (CA) and heterophil-lymphocyte (HL) ratio; n = 477–589), from known-aged individuals of a wild passerine ( Malurus coronatus ). As expected, we find that TL significantly declined with age. To verify whether associations between TL and immune function were independent of parallel age-related changes (e.g. immunosenescence), we statistically controlled for sampling age and used within-subject centring of TL to separate relationships within or between individuals. We found that TL positively predicted CA at the between-individual level (individuals with longer average TL had higher CA), but no other immune indices. By contrast, age predicted the levels of NAbs and HL ratio, allowing inference that respective associations between TL and age with immune indices are independent. Any links existing between TL and fitness are therefore unlikely to be strongly mediated by innate immune function, while TL and immune indices appear independent expressions of individual heterogeneity.

Aging is associated with declines in physiological performance; declining immune defenses particularly could have consequences for age-related fitness and survival. In aging vertebrates, adaptive (memory-based) immune responses typically become impaired, innate (nonspecific) responses undergo lesser declines, and inflammation increases. Longitudinal studies of immune functions in wild animals are rare, yet they are needed to understand immunosenescence under evolutionarily relevant conditions. Using longitudinal data from a tropical passerine (Malurus coronatus) population, we investigate how population trends emerge from within-individual changes and between-individual heterogeneity (e.g., selective disappearance) in immune status. We quantified constitutive immune indexes (haptoglobin [inflammation associated], natural antibodies, complement [lytic] activity, and heterophil-lymphocyte ratio; n p 505–631) in individuals sampled one to seven times over 5 yr. Unexpectedly, longitudinal analyses showed no age-related change within individuals in any immune index, despite sufficient power to detect within-individual change. Between individuals, we found age-related declines in natural antibodies and increases in heterophil-lymphocyte ratios. However, selective disappearance could not adequately explain between-individual age effects, and longitudinal models could not explain our data better than cross-sectional analyses. The lack of clear within-individual immunosenescence is itself notable. Persistent levels of haptoglobin, complement activity, and natural anti- bodies into old age suggests that these immune components are maintained, potentially with adaptive significance.

Elaborate ornamental traits are commonly assumed to be honest signals of individual quality, owing to the presumed costs involved in their production and/or maintenance. Such traits are often highly variable, possibly because of condition-dependence and/or high underlying genetic variation, and it has been suggested that their expression should be more sensitive to condition and/or more heritable than non-ornamental traits. Many bird species display colourful plumage with multiple distinct patches of different developmental origins, forming complex colour phenotypes. Despite this complexity, colourful ornaments are often studied in isolation, without comparison to suitable non-ornamental controls. Based on plumage reflectance data collected over 8 years, we assessed the signalling potential of the multidimensional male colour phenotype in a tropical bird: the purple-crowned fairy-wren Malurus coronatus. Specifically, we tested the predictions that the expression of putative ornamental colours (purple and black - the breeding colours - and blue) is (1) more variable, (2) more heritable and (3) more condition-dependent compared to year-round non-ornamental colours (buff-white and brown). Our results show that ornamental colours exhibit greater levels of variability, and some chromatic components of purple and blue colouration appear slightly heritable (h² = 0.19-0.30). However, contrary to predictions of heightened condition-dependence in ornaments, only brightness of the buff-white and brown colouration increased with male body condition, although brightness of the purple colouration was related to male age as expected. Despite partial support for predictions, the lack of consistent patterns illustrates the complexity of visual signals and highlights the need to study colour phenotypes in their entirety.

Summary Understanding the major evolutionary transition from solitary individuals to complex societies is hampered by incomplete insight into the drivers of living in cooperative groups. 1 , 2 , 3 This may be because the benefits of sociality can derive from group living itself (e.g., dilution of predation risk), 4 , 5 or depend on social context (e.g., kin or potential mates represent beneficial group members). 6 , 7 , 8 Cooperative breeders, where non-breeding subordinates assist breeders, have provided important insights into the drivers of cooperation, but comprehensive assessment of diverse potential benefits has been hindered by a prevailing focus on benefits deriving from raising offspring. 9 , 10 , 11 We propose a novel paradigm to tease apart different benefits by comparing cooperative responses to predators threatening dependent young and adult group members according to their value for the responding individual. Applying this approach in purple-crowned fairy-wrens, Malurus coronatus, we show that non-breeding subordinates are more responsive to nest predators—a threat to offspring—when their probability of inheriting a breeding position is greater—irrespective of group size, relatedness to offspring, or opportunity to showcase individual quality to potential mates. This suggests that offspring defense is modulated according to the benefits of raising future helpers. Conversely, when predators pose a threat to adults, responsiveness depends on social context: subordinates respond more often when kin or potential mates are under threat, or when group members are associated with mutualistic social bonds, indirect genetic benefits, and future reproductive benefits. 9 , 12 , 13 Our results demonstrate that direct and kin-selected benefits of sociality are context dependent, and highlight the importance of predation risk in driving complex sociality.

Although crucial for host survival when facing persistent parasite pressure, costly immune functions will inevitably compete for resources with other energetically expensive traits such as reproduction. Optimizing, but not necessarily maximizing, immune function might therefore provide net benefit to overall host fitness. Evidence for associations between fitness and immune function is relatively rare, limiting our potential to understand ultimate fitness costs of immune investment. Here, we assess how measures of constitutive immune function (haptoglobin, natural antibodies, complement activity) relate to subsequent fitness outcomes (survival, reproductive success, dominance acquisition) in a wild passerine (Malurus coronatus). Surprisingly, survival probability was not positively linearly predicted by any immune index. Instead, both low and high values of complement activity (quadratic effect) were associated with higher survival, suggesting that different immune investment strategies might reflect a dynamic disease environment. Positive linear relationships between immune indices and reproductive success suggest that individual heterogeneity overrides potential resource reallocation trade-offs within individuals. Controlling for body condition (size-adjusted body mass) and chronic stress (heterophil-lymphocyte ratio) did not alter our findings in a sample subset with available data. Overall, our results suggest that constitutive immune components have limited net costs for fitness and that variation in immune maintenance relates to individual differences more closely.

Individual hosts differ extensively in their competence for parasites, but traditional research has discounted this variation, partly because modeling such heterogeneity is difficult. This discounting has diminished as tools have improved and recognition has grown that some hosts, the extremely competent, can have exceptional impacts on disease dynamics. Most prominent among these hosts are the superspreaders, but other forms of extreme competence (EC) exist and others await discovery; each with potentially strong but distinct implications for disease emergence and spread. Here, we propose a framework for the study and discovery of EC, suitable for different host–parasite systems, which we hope enhances our understanding of how parasites circulate and evolve in host communities., Highlights A few members of host populations, so-called superspreaders, have disproportionate impacts on the risk of infectious disease emergence and spread. Several other forms of EC exist; some of which might be exceptionally protective. To discover and understand forms of EC, it is imperative to describe the distribution of, and covariation among, traits of individual hosts that mediate the many stages of host–parasite interactions. Here, we provide a framework to do so, emphasizing how interplay among host traits related to parasite exposure behavior, susceptibility, replicability of parasites on/in hosts, and transmissibility, comprise host competence. We hope this framework helps reveal new forms of EC and informs and improves management of disease risk.

The evolution of conspicuous male traits is thought to be driven by female mate choice or male-male competition. These two mechanisms are often viewed as distinct processes, with most studies focusing on female choice. However, both mechanisms of sexual selection can act simultaneously on the same trait (i.e., dual function) and/or interact in a synergistic or conflicting way. Dual-function traits are commonly assumed to originate through male-male competition before being used in female choice; yet, most studies focusing on such traits could not determine the direction of change, lacking phylogenetic information. We investigated the role of conspicuous male seasonal plumage in male-male competitive interactions in the purple-crowned fairy-wren Malurus coronatus, a cooperatively breeding bird. Male breeding plumage in most Malurus species is selected by female choice through extra-pair mate choice, but unlike its congeners, M.coronatus is genetically monogamous, and females do not seem to choose males based on breeding plumage acquisition. Our study shows that, within groups, subordinate males that were older, and therefore higher-ranked in the queue for breeder position inheritance, produced a more complete breeding plumage. In line with this, subordinate males that were older and/or displayed a more complete breeding plumage were more successful in competitively acquiring a breeder position. A role as a signal of competitive ability was experimentally confirmed by presenting models of males: in breeding colours, these received more aggression from resident breeder males than in nonbreeding colours, but elicited limited response from females, consistent with competitors in breeding plumage being perceived as a bigger threat to the breeder male. The role of the conspicuous breeding plumage in mediating male-male interactions might account for its presence in this genetically monogamous species. As phylogenetic reconstructions suggest a past female choice function in M.coronatus, this could represent a sexual trait that shifted functions, or a dual-function trait that lost one function. These evolutionary scenarios imply that intra- and intersexual functions of ornaments may be gained or lost independently and offer new perspectives in understanding the complex dynamics of sexual selection.

Malarial and other haemosporidian parasites are widespread; however, their temporal dynamics are ill-understood. Longitudinal sampling of a threatened riparian bird revealed a consistently very low prevalence over 13 years (∼5%) despite infections persisting and prevalence increasing with age. In contrast, three key species within this tropical community were highly infected (∼20–75% prevalence) and these differences were stable. Although we found novel lineages and phylogenetic structure at the local level, there was little geographic structuring within Australasia. This study suggests that malarial parasite susceptibility is determined by host factors and that species can maintain low levels despite high community prevalence., Graphical abstract Image 1, Highlights • Malarial parasite prevalence varied between species (∼5–75%). • Persistent and low prevalence over 12y in a riparian bird. • Oldest age category had highest parasite prevalence. • Parasites showed genetic structure at the local level but not within Australasia. • Tropical species can maintain low malarial parasite levels despite high exposure.

Poor conditions during early development can initiate trade-offs that favour current survival at the expense of somatic maintenance and subsequently, future reproduction. However, the mechanisms that link early and late life-history are largely unknown. Recently it has been suggested that telomeres, the nucleoprotein structures at the terminal end of chromosomes, could link early-life conditions to lifespan and fitness. In wild purple-crowned fairy-wrens, we combined measurements of nestling telomere length (TL) with detailed life-history data to investigate whether early-life TL predicts fitness prospects. Our study differs from previous studies in the completeness of our fitness estimates in a highly philopatric population. The association between TL and survival was age-dependent with early-life TL having a positive effect on lifespan only among individuals that survived their first year. Early-life TL was not associated with the probability or age of gaining a breeding position. Interestingly, early-life TL was positively related to breeding duration, contribution to population growth and lifetime reproductive success because of their association with lifespan. Thus, early-life TL, which reflects growth, accumulated early-life stress and inherited TL, predicted fitness in birds that reached adulthood but not noticeably among fledglings. These findings suggest that a lack of investment in somatic maintenance during development particularly affects late life performance. This study demonstrates that factors in early-life are related to fitness prospects through lifespan, and suggests that the study of telomeres may provide insight into the underlying physiological mechanisms linking early- and late-life performance and trade-offs across a lifetime.