Senescing sexual ornaments recover after a sabbatical.

The article discusses research on the effect of age and reproductive effort of male blue-footed boobies to their sexual attractiveness. A long-term dataset revealed that the expression of foot colour, which reflects the sexual attractiveness of the male boobies, deteriorates as animals age and accumulate reproductive events. The authors report that their results support the idea that sexual attractiveness is limited by the allocation of resources to reproduction.