The Attraction of a Colorful Display

The songs of birds offer much to the music lover, but anyone who appreciates color and design has reason to be pleased as well. People of every human culture decorate their world, including their own bodies. In our current culture the female gender dons dress and gloss to attract the male eye and mind.

In the bird world, it is almost always the male who boasts vivid and colorful decoration, and the purpose is always to attract the female. Not all species are brightly colored, but if they are, the color is used as a display. The vividness of the color and the intensity and length of the display indicates the health and strength of the male, and its suitability as a mate. We, who watch birds, are the unintended beneficiary of this decorative display.

Some birds simply have one or two bright colors, like the tanager, but some add to the visual effect by an intricate pattern of color. The male ducks have the most striking combination of vivid color and intricate design. Seen at close range, the colors of all the ducks are amazing, more tightly immaculate than the rarest woven cloth or the most expensive paint. Two of the most decorated are the wood duck and the hooded merganser.

Both of these species spend the winter not too far to our south and push north as soon as the waters thaw. On a recent field trip, nearly a hundred hooded mergansers were sporting beneath the eagle's nest at Gill on the Connecticut River. They are also found with the wood duck on small ponds and marshes.

The wood duck male is one of the most coveted birds on anyone's must-see list, its gaudy dress making it a favorite of photographers and artists. Its plumage is a complex design of colors and patterns with bold white curving stripes on its head and body setting off its darker colored breasts, sides, and wings.

The wood duck grazes the water, gobbling pond weed from the surface, and is extremely spooky, taking off with a whiny piercing scream if you get too close. The hooded merganser dives for its food of fish and frogs, and is a bit more tame, staying around for a close look from the admiring eye.

They are nearly the same size, but the merganser seems smaller, having an air more perky and petite. When I saw one not long ago in a tiny pond, it sat tight, escorting its lady friend slowly across the water and showing off its extraordinary head. It is well-named for its ability to change the shape of both its head and the large white patch on its head, giving the impression that it is wearing a magical hood.

When the bird is at ease, the white patch is large and bold, like a fan or seashell, bordered all around by deepest black. When alarmed or alert, the head feathers are lowered and flattened, shrinking and squeezing the patch to an elongated oval. The distinctive short, thin bill and piercing red eye set in the black face completes the spellbinding impression of this face and head. But the wondrous effect does not stop at the neck.

Two black stripes run forward across the solid white chest to the undersides, marking the break between the white front and the ruddy tan side. For symmetry, there are white stripes at the rear, bold strokes of genius, cascading down the dark back. This design creates a streamlined image that startles the eye and mind into worshipful submission.

Who was the makeup artist who prepared this bird for the show? No French fashion guru could have come up with a more alluring design, and it succeeds. That day the discretely colored lady merganser was in his thrall, helpless before the dazzle of his dress. Her only decoration was the shaggy reddish feathers at the back of her head, perhaps a sign of awe-struck fear in the face of his ethereal beauty.

If decoration has such an effect, it is no wonder we humans strive to enhance our own bodily color and design.