Part 10

Wallace, from whom many of these illustrations are taken, says that to many persons it will seem impossible that such beautiful and detailed adaptations and resemblances—and these are only samples of thousands that occur in all parts of the world—can have been brought about by the preservation of fortuitous useful variations. Yet this will not seem so surprising, continues Wallace, if we keep in mind the facts of the rapid multiplication of animals, the severe struggle for existence, and the constant variability of these and all other organisms; and, further, that we must remember that these delicate adjustments are the result of a process, Natural Selection, which has been going on for millions of years, and that we now see the small percentage of successes among the myriads of failures. “From the very first appearance of insects, for instance, and their various kinds of enemies, the need for protection arose and was usually most easily met by modifications of color. Hence we may be sure that the earliest leaf-eating insects acquired a green color as one of the necessities of their existence; and, as the species became modified and specialized, those feeding on particular species of plants would rapidly acquire the peculiar tints and markings best adapted to conceal them upon those plants. Then, every little variation that, once in a hundred years perhaps, led to the preservation of some insect which was thereby rather better concealed than its fellows, would form the starting-point of a further development, leading ultimately to that perfection of imitation in details which now astonishes us.” So it is with the beautiful color adaptation of birds, mammals, lizards, and other animals. There is a lizard (_Phrynocephalus mystaceus_) inhabiting certain sandy districts in Asia, whose body is protectively colored and some of whose mouth-parts have alluring coloration and form. The general surface harmonizes with the sand in which it is found, while the skin at each angle of its mouth is of red color and so folded as to closely resemble a little red flower which grows in the sand. The lizard, being thus in harmony with its surroundings, resembling the sand and the flowers, is hidden from its enemies, the reptile-eating creatures. But at the same time insects, being attracted by what they take to be flowers, approach the lizards and are thus captured, being allured to their destruction.

[Illustration: PLATE V.—A spider (_Misumena vatia_) lurking for prey on the center of a flower (_Coreopsis_). Illustrating especially alluring Coloration (for attracting prey), but also Protective Resemblance (against enemies). Reproduced from “American Spiders.” By courtesy of Rev. Henry C. McCook.]

=Warning Coloration.= Many animals possess color patterns that render them very _conspicuous_ in their environment. It is a very interesting fact that most of these creatures are the possessors of some deadly weapons, as poison-fangs or stings, or that they are very disagreeable and unpalatable food for other animals. Warning colors are most abundant and best developed among insects. A family of butterflies (Heliconidæ), in tropical South America, possesses very pronounced and conspicuous color patterns, so that they are easily seen in their native haunts. Many of them have deep blue-black with vivid red, white, and yellow spots and bands, totally unlike those butterflies in the same locality that are protectively colored and palatable. Their bodies have juices that exhale a powerful odor. If one kill them by pinching the body, a liquid exudes that stains the fingers yellow and leaves an odor on them that can be removed only by repeated washing of the hands. There is a great deal of evidence to show that this odor is very offensive to insect-loving animals. Protectively-colored butterflies fly with great rapidity and are very wary and seek concealment; while the butterflies with conspicuous colors fly slowly, and do not conceal themselves, as if conscious that they have no enemies.

Many caterpillars have gay and conspicuous colors and do not conceal themselves. Bates noticed one in South America four inches long, striped across the body with yellow and black bands, and with bright red head, tail, and legs. It could be seen by any one who passed by, even at a distance of many meters. All of these conspicuous and brightly-colored caterpillars are unpalatable, and are refused as food by insect-eating creatures.

Grasshoppers and locusts generally possess green protective tints and are very palatable, but in tropical regions there are many species most gaudily decorated with blue, red, and black colors. They are inedible and are invariably rejected as food by lizards and birds.

A spider whose bite is exceedingly poisonous is found in Queensland. Its bite will kill a dog, and produces serious illness in man, with agonizing pain. It is black with a bright red patch on the middle of its body. This warning coloration is so conspicuous that even the spider-hunting wasp avoids it.

In all parts of the world frogs are usually protectively colored with browns or greens; and little tree-frogs are either curiously mottled to imitate dead leaves or bark, or they are green like the leaves they rest upon. These protectively colored frogs are always eagerly sought after by snakes and other enemies. But there are some frogs that are very conspicuously colored and that hop about with impunity, being avoided by the snakes and birds of prey. Such is a little frog in Nicaragua which with its “scarlet vest and stockings of blue” is very conspicuous in its native haunts.[9] Such, also, is a small toad found in South America, which is colored a bright vermilion and an intense black, which crawls about in the sunshine over the sands of arid places. Both of these animals are altogether avoided by the frog-eating creatures, because they have disagreeable properties that make them inedible.

In tropical America the very poisonous snake Elaps (Plate VI) is found abundantly. Its style of coloration is very conspicuous and one that does not occur in any other group of snakes, consisting alternately of rings of red, black, and yellow, or red and black of varying width and arranged in different patterns. Snake-eating birds and mammals have learned, through hereditary experiences, to avoid these snakes with gay livery because they are poisonous and therefore dangerous. In Plate VII the conspicuously-colored black and yellow salamander is an animal with warning coloration. It is inedible and avoided by carnivorous birds. These warning colorations have been evolved through the Natural Selection of fortuitous useful color variations in the ancestors during the Geologic Ages.

[Illustration: PLATE VI.—Illustrating Warning Coloration (_Elaps_) and especially Mimicry (_Erythrolamprus_). Elaps is a very poisonous reptile and Erythrolamprus is harmless. Reproduced (and modified) from Romanes’s “Darwin and after Darwin.” By courtesy of the Open Court Publishing Company.]

=Mimicry.= Protective resemblance of a harmless animal to another of a different species that is harmful is known as mimicry. Mimicry is bound up with and altogether dependent upon warning coloration. Some beetles are protected by having integuments, etc., of very great hardness. Several genera of weevils are in this way saved from attack by insect-loving birds. These weevils are often closely imitated in appearance by softer and more eatable species of different genera from the weevils. Wasps and bees are often mimicked by insects of other orders.

Insectivorous birds are very active in hunting out the edible beetles (Longicornia), and everywhere in tropical regions these beetles so closely resemble other insects which are avoided by the birds that the longicorns are very frequently avoided and thus protected.

In tropical America many butterflies (Heliconidæ) are found that possess warning coloration. They possess an offensive taste and odor which almost entirely exempt them from the attacks of insect-eating animals. The insectivorous birds have learned, by transmitted experiences (heredity) to avoid the Heliconidæ. It is an interesting fact that in the same locality with these distasteful butterflies are other species that are very palatable to insectivorous creatures; but they so closely resemble the non-edible species that the birds pass them by, not recognizing their character.

There are some cases of mimicry among birds. There is a genus of large honey-suckers known as friar birds found in the Malay Archipelago. They are noisy and powerful birds which go in small flocks. They have sharp beaks which are long and curved, and also powerful grasping claws. They are perfectly able to defend themselves, often driving away such birds of prey as hawks and crows when they approach them too closely. In the same environment are weak and timid birds known as orioles, which trust chiefly to their retiring habits and concealment for protection. The orioles, although an entirely distinct species from the friar birds, very closely resemble the latter. In each of the great islands of the Malayan Archipelago there is a distinct species of friar birds, and always in the same locality is a species of oriole that exactly mimics it. The separate species often look so thoroughly alike that competent naturalists, prior to a very close examination, have considered them as belonging to the same species.[10]

The most remarkable cases of mimicry are those in which poisonous snakes are mimicked by harmless ones. There is an egg-eating snake in South Africa that possesses neither teeth nor fangs and is not poisonous. It very closely resembles the poisonous Berg adder. When alarmed it still more closely resembles the adder by the habit of flattening its head and darting forward as if to strike an enemy, hissing at the same time.

[Illustration: PLATE VII.—An Amphibian (_Salamandra maculosa_) illustrating Warning Coloration.]

In tropical America, in the localities where the poisonous genus Elaps is found so abundantly, are several genera of harmless snakes of other families, some species of which so closely resemble or mimic the poisonous species that they are distinguished from them with difficulty. The peculiar color patterns of the poisonous snakes serve as warning colors to snake-eating mammals and birds. The mimicking snakes by flying these danger-flags are protected.

In Plate VI Elaps is the venomous snake, and illustrates warning coloration; Erythrolamprus is the edible, non-venomous reptile that has acquired, through Natural Selection, a protective resemblance to Elaps, and illustrates mimicry. At the first glance these two snakes look very much alike; but a closer inspection will show that the detailed color patterns differ in the two cases. Elaps, though a very poisonous snake, has the reputation of not being venomous. This error has probably originated from the fact that it has a gentle disposition and mild temper, and also from the fact that no doubt it is frequently mistaken for the mimicking non-venomous species.

Both warning coloration and mimicry are interesting illustrations of adaptation to environment through Natural Selection; for the myriads of ancestral forms were continually giving slight variations in color patterns, some of which were useful to the creatures and others harmful. Those that harmonized mostly with the environment gave their possessors an advantage in the fierce struggle for life,—the struggle for food and place and safety; and procreating their kind age after age, led to the perfection of mimicry as we behold it to-day.

=Coloration as Recognition Marks.= In gregarious animals, whether herbivora or carnivora, and whether mammals or birds, a ready recognition of their own kind at a distance, in the dim twilight, or during rapid motion, is of the greatest use, and probably often leads to the preservation of life. Gregarious animals will not usually permit a stranger in their midst. So long as these animals keep together they are generally safe from enemies; but a single animal straggling off by itself may become an easy prey to enemies. In such cases it is of the highest importance to an animal that it should have every facility for quickly discovering its companions at any distance within the field of vision. Also to the young and inexperienced of each herd some means of easy recognition is of vital importance. Recognition marks also enable the sexes to identify their kind readily. The necessity for easy recognition probably is at the basis of the bilateral symmetry in the coloration of animals.[11] In the struggle for existence those gregarious creatures that have the best color patterns for recognition marks are the most likely to get the scattered members of a herd together with the greatest rapidity, and thus to save them from their enemies. The surviving members, transmitting their useful variations in recognition marks to their offspring, are thus able in the course of ages to bring into existence pronounced color patterns. Thus Natural Selection can account for much of the coloration in animals known as recognition marks.

One or two illustrations of recognition marks in creatures will be sufficient. A rabbit when alarmed and fleeing to its burrow displays a conspicuous, upturned white tail. The rest of the body is protectively colored. This conspicuous white surface of the upturned tail is a signal flag of danger. The rabbit mostly feeds during moonlight nights, or soon after sunset. The white upturned tails of alarmed rabbits serve as signals and guides to the feeble and young, and also to those at a more remote distance. Thus a number of rabbits, each following the one or two in front, are all able in the quickest manner to reach a place of safety.

The spring-bok has a white patch on the face and one on the sides. It also has a curiously well-marked white stripe above the tail. When the animal is at rest this last-mentioned white stripe is very nearly concealed by a fold of skin, but when it is in motion it comes into full view, like the upturned tail of the rabbit, and serves as a guide to friends. There are some animals inhabiting the Arctic regions that are not white,—they are not protectively colored. Such is the musk-sheep. This animal, though living in Arctic regions, is yet brown and conspicuous. Its safety depends upon its association in small herds. It is gregarious. Therefore it is of much more importance to this animal that it should be able to quickly recognize its companions at a distance than that it should be protectively colored and so concealed from its enemies. So long as they keep together in herds they are abundantly able to protect themselves. This is an exception to the rule of local color adaptation that proves the rule.

=Sexual Selection.= Among most backboned animals it is the rule that both sexes should be alike in color. This is especially true among the fishes, reptiles, and mammals. But in birds the diversity of sexual coloring is very frequent. It is among this class, therefore, that Sexual Selection can best be studied. One of the most fundamental characteristics of birds is the greater conspicuousness of coloration in the males. In the tropical regions especially are found the most striking examples of divergence in sexual color patterns. In humming birds, the pheasants, the peacocks, chatterers, tanagers, and birds of paradise, the females are exceptionally dull-colored and plain, while the male birds are gorgeously colored and conspicuously attractive. The male birds of paradise, for instance, are not only brilliantly colored, but also have remarkable gorgets, plumes, and crests; whereas the female paradise birds are without these decorations and as plain as our thrushes in their ornamental plumage (Plate VIII).

The splendor of plumage which characterizes the male pheasants is entirely wanting in the females. The intense crimsons and pure whites, the gorgeous purples and blues of the male chatterers contrast strikingly with the dull browns or olive greens of the females. The sober hues of the females have been accentuated by Natural Selection.[12] When the females were brooding on the eggs in their nests, those of them that had varied in the direction of conspicuousness would most readily be detected by their enemies, the hawks, and would be exterminated; but those that had quiet and dull ornamentation would most frequently escape discovery, and would pass successfully through the brooding season; thus living and transmitting their color patterns to posterity,—Natural Selection ever eliminating the conspicuous and preserving the sober-hued,—in the course of time the dull ornamentation of the females would become more and more pronounced.

[Illustration: PLATE VIII.—Male and Female Paradise Birds (_Paradisea minor_). Illustrating the effects of Sexual Selection. The upper figure (male bird) is much more beautiful than the lower (female bird).]

But another factor has been at work in accentuating the marked differences in the ornamentation of the sexes. This factor is Sexual Selection.[13] In the brooding season there is an intense rivalry among the males for the possession of the females. Among them the art of courting has become, indeed, one of the fine arts. The male birds, like the males of almost all animals, have stronger passions than the females, and with rarest exceptions are much more eager than the females. In courtship they display their adornments and accomplishments most zealously before the females; they strut around them in most eager courtship and pompous vanity, displaying the utmost rivalry. The males charm the females in various ways, such as dancing, or performing fantastic antics either in the air or on the ground; and then again by most melodious song. After man, the female birds appear to be the most æsthetic of all animals; therefore, those male birds that are the most pleasing songsters, or the most attractive in their dances and fantastic performances, are the ones selected by the females for mating. In this selection the female birds have paid the minutest attention to fleeting fashions in strut and dance, in form and color,—the progeny of those males that have been selected by the females for mating, transmitting the inherited peculiarities of the parents, have tended more and more to stamp as fixtures these fleeting fashions, and in this way the males have become endowed with all sorts of decorations and accomplishments.[14] Thus have been produced in them the many forms of topknots, wattles, combs, plumes, and feathers elongated and springing gracefully from many portions of the body; also the naked skin of the head and the beak, frequently colored gorgeously. The feathers, through this means, are often most beautifully tinted in charming patterns. As bearing upon this theory of Sexual Selection, it can be observed that birds pay the closest attention to the songs of each other. A bullfinch, for instance, had been taught to pipe a German waltz, and in doing so was a most excellent performer. He was placed in a room where there were kept some eighteen canaries and linnets, and immediately commenced producing his melodies. The birds all ranged themselves on the sides of their cages nearest the performer, listening to his singing with the greatest interest. Undoubtedly this singing is most often a matter of courtship; the female finch selects that one out of a hundred males whose notes charm her the most; the female canary always chooses the best singer. The soft cooing of pigeons and of turtledoves is a matter of courtship. In the breeding season there is the most intense rivalry between the males in singing; a bird will sometimes sing until he drops down almost dead.

That female birds exercise choice in mating was believed by Audubon. He describes how a woodpecker hen was followed by six gay suitors who continued to perform strange antics until a marked preference was shown for one of them. A study of the Australian bower-birds illustrates both the courting antics of the males and the exercise of choice by the females. These birds build bowers which are sometimes quite large. That of one species is raised on a thick platform of sticks and is nearly four feet in length and eighteen inches in height. These bowers are built on the ground, and are for the sole purpose of courtship, since the nests are formed in the trees. They are highly decorated with leaves, berries, feathers, shells, and kindred objects. Both sexes assist in the erection of the bower, although the male bird is the principal worker. The bower-constructing instinct is so strong that it is practiced even in confinement. A naturalist in describing the habits of some satin bower-birds kept in an aviary says that at times the male will chase the female all over the aviary, then go to the bower, pick up a gay feather or a large leaf, utter a curious kind of note, set all his feathers erect, run round the bower, and become so excited that his eyes appear to start from his head. He continues opening first one wing and then the other, uttering a low, whistling note, and, like the domestic cock, seems to be picking up something from the ground, until at last the female goes gently toward him and the wooing is completed.

Instances of love dances may be taken from all classes of the animal kingdom. “Mr. Peckham has described a very interesting love-dance by a certain species of spider (_Saitis pulex_). He placed a male in a box with a female. As soon as the former saw the latter, about twelve inches away, he became excited and at once moved towards her; when some four inches from her, he stood still, and then began the most remarkable performances that an amorous male could offer to an admiring female. She eyed him eagerly, changing her position from time to time so that he might always be in view. He, raising his whole body on one side by straightening out the legs, and lowering it on the other by folding the first two pairs of legs up and under, leaned so far over as to be in danger of losing his balance, which he maintained only by sidling rapidly towards the lowered side. The palpus, too, on this side, was turned back to correspond to the direction of the legs nearest it. He moved in a semicircle of about two inches, and then instantly reversed the position of the legs, and circled in the opposite direction, gradually approaching nearer and nearer the female. Now she dashes towards him, while he, raising his first pair of legs, extends them upward and forward as if to hold her off, but withal slowly retreats. Again and again he circles from side to side, she gazing towards him in a softer mood, evidently admiring the grace of his antics. This is repeated until are counted one hundred and eleven circles made by the ardent little male. Now he approaches nearer and nearer, and when almost within reach whirls madly around and around her, she joining and whirling with him in a giddy maze. Again he falls back and resumes his semicircular motions, with his body tilted over; she, all excitement, lowers her head and raises her body, so that it is almost vertical; both draw nearer; she moves slowly under him, he crawling over her head, and the mating is accomplished.”[15]