No bull，lizards flee when they see red

By Sean Paul

導讀:一項研究發現，相對于藍色，蜥蜴會對紅色更敏感。

You wouldn’tthink studyinglizardsisa particularly dangerous profession.Until,that is,sheriffs approach you with their guns drawn.“We get the cops called on us sometimes.”

Bree Putman,a behavioral ecologist at U.C.L.A.and the NaturalHistory Museum ofLosAngeles.Her colleague at the museum,Greg Pauly,really did end up on the wrong side of a gun once,and here’s why:

“A lot of times we’re doing work at night in people’s neighborhoods and we’re using flashlights to look for geckos on the sides of people’s houses.And so sometimes people willthink we’re criminals or burglars or something.”

The museum’s solution was neon orange shirts with the museum logo.And we call these shirts the “don’t shoot me”shirts.But the bright orange left Putman with a concern:that the color would spook the very animals they were trying to study.

So she devised an experiment.“I basically designed a study to show to the museum staff that these shirts were

not going to be good for research,and that’s what I found.”

你也許認為研究蜥蜴不會是一個危險的職業，直到警察拔出槍指著你的時候。“我們有時會被警察傳訊。”

布里·普特曼是一名行為生態學家，目前在加州大學洛杉磯分校和洛杉磯自然歷史博物館工作。她在博物館的同事格雷格·保利確實有過一次被誤傷的下場，原因如下：

“我們晚上經常會在小區里工作，用手電筒在人們房屋的四周尋找壁虎。所以有的時候人們會以為我們是罪犯或是小偷什么的。”

博物館的對策就是讓我們穿上帶有博物館標志的橙色襯衫。我們把這個襯衣叫作“別對我開槍”襯衫。但是鮮艷的橙色讓布里有點擔心：襯衣的顏色可能會把他們想研究的動物嚇跑。

于是她設計了一個實驗：“我就是想通過這個實驗向博物館的工作人員證明這個襯衫對研究沒有益處，這就是我的發現。”

In her trials,Putman wore tank tops of various colors—red,gray,lightblue,dark blue—and then attempted to approach and capture western fence lizards in public and private parkland in L.A.And she found that when wearing dark blue,she could get twice as close to the lizards,compared to when she wore red.And she was about twice as likely to catch a lizard too,while wearing dark or light blue,compared to red or gray.The study appears in the journal PLOS ONE.

Putman thinks that the lizards may be more tolerant of blue hues,because they most closely resemble the blue patches males have on their bellies—a sexual signal.Other studies have shown that birds with orange and red plumage are similarly less creeped out by orange and red shirts.She’s not ready to issue a dress code to hikers just yet.

“You know for a scientist or biologist working with wild animals,you want to make sure either that you’re wearing the same outfit every time you’re going to do animal behavior.Or you want to randomize what you wear.”

As for those museum shirts,I actually wear the orange shirt.I don’t wear a blue shirt.Because studying wildlife in urban areas,you never know when you might encounter that other species:gun-toting Homo sapiens.

測驗時，普特曼分別穿上紅色、灰色、淺藍、深藍四種不同顏色的背心,然后開始試著在洛杉磯私人或公共的公園捕捉西方強棱蜥。然后她發現與穿紅色衣服相比，穿深藍色衣服時，她與那些蜥蜴的距離能拉近兩倍。而且相對于穿紅色或灰色衣服，穿淺藍或者深藍背心的時候，會有兩倍的概率能抓住那些蜥蜴。這一研究發表在PLOS ONE雜志上面。

普特曼認為蜥蜴也許更適應藍色調，因為這種色調最接近雄性發出求愛信號時腹部出現的藍色斑塊。另外還有研究顯示，有橙色或紅色羽毛的鳥類也更不容易被橙色和紅色襯衫嚇到。但她還沒準備好為徒步旅行者建議著裝要求。

“對于一個研究野生動物的科學家或者生物學家來說，你想確定你是每次研究動物行為時都穿同一件衣服，還是想隨機選擇衣著。”

我事實上還是會穿博物館的橙色襯衫，而不是藍色襯衫。因為在城市研究野生動物時，你永遠不知道會不會遇到其他更危險的生物，比如持槍的人類。