A female purple-throated carib isn't just interested in the plumage of a male hummingbird. She also wants to know what he owns. Good looks and a nice personality are secondary. In what is believed to be a unique relationship in the world of birds, a male purple-throated carib doesn't just protect his own territory. He also holds a significant portion of his kingdom in reserve for females only, thus attracting many potential mates that he can observe and either select or shoo away.
"I don't know of anything else like it," John Kress, a botanist with the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History, said in a telephone interview. Kress and a colleague, Ethan Temeles, an ornithologist and biology professor at Amherst College in Massachusets
"I don't know of anything else like it," John Kress, a botanist with the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History, said in a telephone interview. Kress and a colleague, Ethan Temeles, an ornithologist and biology professor at Amherst College in Massachusets
, disclosed their discovery in the online edition of The Proceedings of the Royal Society B.
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