Regent Honeyeater relationships & mimicry

["Philip Veerman" <>]

Thanks for that. This paper (below) cites my work on the mimicry of Wattlebirds by the Regent Honeyeater. That is, it mentions my 1992 ABW paper but not the 1994 ABW paper that has more analysis of the issue. Suffice to say that I believed at the time I first heard it (3-9-1974) that the fact that the Regent Honeyeater makes calls almost identical to the Red Wattlebird (when associating with it) was a sign of close relationship. The idea of mimicry was suggested to me by someone else and over the years I collected evidence and followed through on this and have put forward a suggestion about possible adaptive significance of the behaviour. I am of the opinion that the behaviour is mimicry in the true sense of the word, not just copying and yet the capacity to do that behaviour is strongly based on evolutionary connection of the Regent Honeyeater to those other species.

 

Philip