Marg - the striking similarity of the blue of bottle top and iris certainly prompts such a thought but the answer is no, I think. Green fruits and dead
leaves seem to be most in favour, even for the yellow-irised Regent. Blue is also popular with some others, apparently. g
From: Marg Peachey [
Sent: Saturday, 12 March 2016 6:59 PM
To: Geoffrey Dabb
Cc: Canberra Birds
Subject: Re: [canberrabirds] What is colour - the eye of the bowerbird, a final comment
Hi Geoffrey,
Does the eye colour of all bower bird species indicate the colour of the trinkets they decorate their bowers?
On Sat, Mar 12, 2016 at 4:28 PM, Geoffrey Dabb <> wrote:
Here the aim is to produce a natural ‘as seen’ image, or a poorer one - the reverse of the usual photographic ambition which is to produce a better view than you might get with
binoculars. None of the upper 6 involved flash or significant brightening. The eye appearance suggests ‘dull mauve’ is not a bad description and a couple even suggest a possible origin of the ‘apricot’ eyes in the HANZAB illustrations, possibly derived from
such photos. All except the upper left one are of my current near-adult male. To show that the otherwise invisible veining is a component of the apparent colour I have lightened the images in the yellow frame, although it might be difficult to get much of
that at the scale presented here. Thanks to the subscribers who mentioned to me ‘violet eyes’ which is what started me on this again.
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