Today we have two photographs from crack bird photographer and retired medical entomologist Scott Ritchie, who lives in Cairns, Australia. His captions are indented and you can enlarge the photos by clicking on them. Note: the bower is not a nest, though many people think it is. In fact it is simply a structure designed to attract female bowerbirds—an “extended phenotype” of sexual display, as Richard Dawkins might call it. As Scott notes below, the nest is built separately—by the female.
Here’s another couple of photos that might interest your readers. Picture one. The bower of the Golden Bowerbird [Prionodura newtoniana]. Photographed in the tropical rainforest in the Atherton Tablelands southwest of Cairns, Queensland Australia, this bower is a bachelor’s pad where he swoons females. The male builds this extravagant stick structure, decorating it with lichens and flowers. Females come and inspect the bower and give it (or not) her seal of approval. He always displays for her at the bower, and makes the most unusual metallic calls. If she likes it enough, the good old boy gets lucky. A brief cloacal kiss at the bower and off she goes. The male of course, keeps tidying up his bower, putting more extravagant displays up to an almost Mar-a-Lago structure. They last for years. The female, of course, is left to do the heavy lifting of building the proper nest and raising the chicks.
Picture number two entitled.” Are you free for dinner tonight?” Here the male Golden Bowerbird brings an inflorescence of the Melicope tree to decorate his bower. This “flower” is highly valued by Golden Bowerbirds, and this fellow hopes these red roses will win the day—or rather the night—for him.
Perfect!
A nice, informative story and illustrations Scott. HowDO these behaviors come about? Thanks
Is the nest then build nearby the bower? Do they reuse the long lasting bowers? If not, and they can last for years, who would move into the structure. I can’t believe something that intricate and sturdy it would go unused!
The male Golden Bowerbird is a spiffy little fellow! Nice pictures!
Ohhhhhh! New bucket list item: seeing a courting bowerbird!!! Thanks for these excellent photos.
There was a bacteriophage meeting in Cairns (which is approximately pronounced Cannes) last year, too.
Beautiful shot of a beautiful bird. I was thinking that Jerry had featured this bower business in a post from a few years past, but maybe not. I remember some elaborate pendulous stick type nests hanging from some tree. Similarly elaborate in a sort of unattractive way. I think the other one was in a drier ecosystem. Anyway, birds are crazy little dinosaurs. I love ’em.