AB Intro Part 1

Food color preference of avian foragers has not been widely studied.  Globally, the most common fruit color of bird-dispersed plants are red and black.  Other preferential fruit colors include blue and purple, while orange and green are rarely chosen (Janson 1983).  Fruit colors are commonly considered to increase the conspicuousness of ripe fruit in order to attract birds to disperse the enclosed seeds.  The preference of fruit color in avian foragers may be due to a variety of factors. The factors hypothesized to affect food color choice include background color, the prevalence of one color, and nutritional value associated with certain colors (Willson, 1990).  In our study, we would examine food color preferences of three parrot species living in areas of the Amazon rainforest that are in need of ecological restoration.