I realise that this forum is seen more as a place to report than as a
venue for discussion these days, but I'll offer these anyway in case
anyone's interested in thinking about them. Both were questions asked
yesterday at a course I'm teaching, and I can't satisfactorily answer
either.
1. Why are NZ birds generally less brightly coloured than east coast
Australian ones?
A couple of possible responses occur to me:
a. It's a false premise - there are too few terrestrial native NZ
species to make a valid comparison.
b. NZ species tend to be dense forest dwellers, where colour is less
relevant in communication than in the open forests and woodlands of
eastern Australia. But since I haven't even set foot in our nearest
Gondwanan neighbour I'm not even sure if my starting point is correct.
In any case I don't find either response very satisfactory.
2. What is it about WA that 'fades' birds?! eg Yellow-tailed to
White-tailed Black-cockies; Eastern Yellow to Western Yellow and
White-breasted Robins.
It's such a small sample size that I'm forced to concede that it's
probably coincidence, but that doesn't satisy me either.
My apologies if this isn't what you want to read here, but I hope that
it is of interest to someone out there anyway.
cheers
Ian
--
Ian Fraser,
Environment Tours; Vertego Environmental Consultancy
PO Box 4148, Weston Creek, ACT 2611
ph: 61 2 6287 4813
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