Some researchers suspect that courtship displays do more than advertise one's ability to carry a burden or perform a taxing chore. Displays that once were merely colorful become outlandish. Some species get around the problem by keeping these added burdens temporary. Widowbirds jettison their long tails when they're through courting for the season. Elk and caribou shed their antlers at the end of the annual rut.
Some species avoid burdening themselves by keeping their finery detached.
Rival males often raid one another's bowers and steal decorations, which may be how an elaborate bower signifies that its defender is fit. Instead these animals develop other ways to make themselves desirable. Cotton-top tamarins are a species of New World macaque that typically bears twins. This is more monkey than a mother can handle alone, so males in the group help out with child care. In the late 1980s, primatologist Eluned Price, then at Scotland's University of Stirling, studied courtship strategies in a troop of captive cotton-tops.