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Finches Seek Out Sick Dining Companions

When you’re looking for a table in a crowded cafeteria, you probably give wide berth to the family that sounds like it’s sharing a big dish of whooping cough. Well, not if you’re a house finch, particularly a male. Because a study in the journal Biology Letters [by Karen M. Bouwman and Dana M. Hawley at Virginia Tech; see HGw7] shows that male finches actually prefer feeding near males who are visibly ill.


要是你要在人滿為患的餐廳找個(gè)位子，那你肯定會(huì)離那些有百日咳癥狀的人們遠(yuǎn)遠(yuǎn)的。但如果你是只雀，尤其還要是只雄雀，估計(jì)就不會(huì)這么干了。為什么呢？《生物學(xué)通訊》雜志上的一篇文章中寫(xiě)道：實(shí)際上，雄雀比較喜歡和看上去病怏怏的雄性同類(lèi)一起搶食。


Finches don’t get whooping cough. But they are susceptible to infection with something called Mycoplasma gallisepticum, a bug that leaves them lethargic and sporting a bad case of conjunctivitis, otherwise known as pinkeye. The disease is quite contagious and can be passed from one finch to another while dining beak-to-beak. All the more reason, you’d think, for healthy birds to avoid sitting next to someone with crusty red peepers. Yet male house finches, when given a choice, opt to break breadcrumbs with males who are obviously under the weather.


雀類(lèi)不會(huì)得百日咳，不過(guò)它們很容易感染雞敗血支原體。感染了這個(gè)，雀類(lèi)就會(huì)昏昏欲睡，精神不振，還伴隨著嚴(yán)重的結(jié)膜炎癥，也就是紅眼病。紅眼病是接觸傳染的，雀類(lèi)嘴碰嘴搶食時(shí)就很容易相互傳染。你肯定會(huì)想，這樣一來(lái)，健健康康的小鳥(niǎo)們就更不會(huì)呆在有著兇惡的紅眼的同類(lèi)身邊啦。但是，雄雀不一樣，它們還就喜歡呆在“病人”身邊進(jìn)食。


Why risk catching a nasty infection when all you really want to catch is a quick bite? Because males infected with Mycoplasma tend to be less aggressive. So eating with the infirm means you’re more likely to wind up with seed in your beak than a beak in your eye.

只是為了搶點(diǎn)東西吃吃嘛，干嘛還要去冒被傳染的危險(xiǎn)呢？原來(lái)，感染了支原菌的雄雀攻擊性大大減弱了，怪不得了。這樣一來(lái)，和這些“病人”在一起搶飯吃，成功的幾率可是大大增加，吃在嘴里可要比看在眼里強(qiáng)得多了?。?/div>


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