And maybe Dean Portelli was not justified in assuming the bird making the
"male" call was indeed the male.
Why could not it be the female that sings first? Male chauvinism was rife
when Australian birds were first being studied by Europeans. They would
have just assumed it was the male anyway. If anyone can point me in the
direction of any study that has determined the matter, I'd be most grateful.
Peter Ogilvie has had a particular interest in whipbirds - even before he
took up residence in Upper Brookfield where he has them on his land. I once
asked Peter if he could tell which was male and which female: "Only if I
saw one lay an egg!" was his succinct reply.
I quizzed Peter Slater (the University of St Andrews one, not the Oz
version) about the whipbird entry in his (and Catchpole's) "Bird Song" book.
They discuss the duet (p. 175) but refer only to "Bird 1" and Bird 2". He
said they carefully avoided the question of which sex initiated the duet,
and drew my attention to a paper about some central American birds where it
was established by laparoscopy that it was the females that initiated the
duet.
Cheers
Syd
> From: knightl <>
> Date: Mon, 19 May 2003 17:17:38 +1000
> To: "Dean Portelli" <>
> Cc:
> Subject: Re: [BIRDING-AUS] Re: Redwood Park - Toowoomba: Eastern Whipbird
>
> Perhaps he saw the "male" calling [ie saw the bird making the male
> call].
>
> Regards, Laurie
>
> On Sunday, May 18, 2003, at 09:16 PM, Dean Portelli wrote:
>
>> Nicholas Talbot noted that he recorded Eastern Whipbird at Redwood
>> Park and made the following comment: "best view was of a male just
>> coming into adult plumage". I am curious as to how the sex of the bird
>> was determined. In my experience with the species the sexes are
>> indistinguishable based on plumage (and I just checked, the latest
>> HANZAB states the same), with at least some established pairs it can
>> be relatively easy to tell them apart when they are together (the male
>> is larger. I spent some time helping a PhD student working with a
>> colour-banded population so all the sexes were known once the birds
>> had been handled, measured and banded).
>> I wonder if Nicholas is using Pizzey & Knight's field guide, if so the
>> labels on the plate are incorrect. They should read from left to
>> right: juvenile (NOT Imm.), immature (or first basic plumage NOT
>> female) and adult (or definitive plumage, NOT specifically male). The
>> text describes the female as being browner with white mottling on the
>> throat. HANZAB makes no such conclusion.
>> Cheers, Dean
>
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