In this dramatically sexually dimorphic species, the males, aside from being brightly coloured, has a set of highly modified display plumes and a pair of coral coloured legs and feet. This is in stark contrast to the females who are smaller and have a mixture of black and brown plumage.
As in real estate, courtship is all about location, location, location. Males begin the process by finding a bare, dead tree snag from which to display from. Once there he lets out three distinct vocalisations, two of which appear to be for advertisement and one is for the display. Once the female has arrived the real singing begins.
In company with the singing comes the dancing, holding the wings open to maximise display of his brilliant colours. This includes leg postures that better present his beautiful coral legs are one of two factors of the display that are unusual. The other gives the bird its name, the wire-wipe display.
During this, the male performs many slow and exaggerated body movements by hopping to this alterante foot postions, all the while pointing his wires towards the female so that he can, very delicately, brush them across her face which impresses her. The paper goes into great detail in explaining the whole process but its too much writing so I will just put a video up.
References
Frith C. B. & Beehler, B. M. (1997). Courtship and mating behaviour of the twelve-wired bird of paradise seleucidis melanoleuca. Emu, 97(2), 133-140.
After all that effort, she didn’t seem to impressed by his wire-brushing! Very interesting display. The birds of paradise are an extremely diverse group. You mention that the males give three distinct vocalisations, yet I could only really discern one vocalisation type from the video. Can you elaborate a bit further on this aspect?
ReplyDeleteThe three distinct vocalisations, I think, cover all his vocalisations, not necessarily when all of them when he first arrives. The paper doesn't seem to explain that bit. The two advertisement calls are explained. The first is a throaty, down slurred "harnh" or "hahn" note that is vocalised every 30 seconds. The second is usually 4-5 notes: "hahr - haw haw haw"; the first note is high pitched which is then followed by a pause and then the rest of the notes in rapid succession. The third vocalisation is produced when display is imminent. There is a high pitch, alomst whiny series of notes: "hahng - hahng - hahng - hahng". They did note that male vocalisation, although being important, was not always observed. I hope that helped. Clear as mud I'm sure.
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