Can anyone tell me whether black-faced monarchs males have any particular display to their females? Today I saw an immature male perched on a branch and several times he spread his wings and tail and ducked his head from side to side sort of like he was fixing the feathers on the undersides of his wings . Each time he did this, it was followed by a loud burst of song then he’d hop to another branch and do it again. I don’t know much about monarchs and this sort of behaviour isn’t mentioned in any of my books.
Anyone????????
Karen Hunt
===============================
To unsubscribe from this mailing list, send the message: unsubscribe (in the body of the message, with no Subject line) to: birding-aus-request@vicnet.net.au
http://birding-aus.org ===============================
Hi Karen, I am sorry for my delay in responding to you. Thank you for your very interesting post about monarch behaviour from 7/04/12 where you observed a young male Black-faced Monarch performing. I have also seen this male display within genus Monarcha, however my experience has been with our very poorly known Black-winged Monarch. Like you, I found it difficult to find anything in the Australian literature recording this display – even in HANZAB where there is no mention of it. I believe that Coates has published material on something similar, but this is from extralimital observations, I think with the Island Monarch.I have also asked a number of prominent Australian birders if they knew of this behaviour in Monarcha, but apart from the Coates material, no-one had any knowledge of it. My experience was in January 2012 at my study site to the north of Cooktown. An adult male Black-winged Monarch was lifting & spreading his wings while singing his usual song, with the display also including him lifting & fanning his tail. His head was held in a number of positions, from being held upright & looking side to side, then bowed down in front & then he twisted his head up & around to his lower back, as though he were preening. When his wings were held up, they were mostly spread & continuously kept at or above a horizontal position. However, at times he briefly held his wings down, somewhat cuckoo like, but with his tail lifted & fanned at the same time. The whole display was seen by me only on one occasion & with no other Black-winged Monarchs very closeby. I was very certain that this was a display & not that he was merely preening himself. Karen, I have plenty of images recording this behaviour & some of these roughies are attached herewith for you. (Of course, for all on the Birding-Aus list, these will not be attached here). Please let me know what you think & if this is pretty much waht you observed in your young Black-faced Monarch… I would be very interested if anyone else has seen anything similar to this. It seems that no-one has, since I haven’t seen any comments in reply to Karen’s on the list… perhaps some were made off-list? Best regards for now, Martin Cachard, Cairns, 0428 782 808
===============================
To unsubscribe from this mailing list, send the message: unsubscribe (in the body of the message, with no Subject line)
http://birding-aus.org ===============================