(Source: Texas A&M University) Independent male ruff at lek with colorful ruff and head tuft. Photo credit: Ola Jennersten. The ruff is a Eurasian shorebird that has a spectacular 'lekking' behavior where highly ornamented males gather in a single location and compete for females. Now two groups, one led by researchers at the Texas A&M University College of Veterinary Medicine & Biomedical Sciences (CVM) and Uppsala University, report that males with alternative reproductive strategies carry a chromosomal rearrangement that has been maintained as a balanced genetic polymorphism, leading to three types of ruff males, for about 4 million years. The two studies are published today in Nature...
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