44 IOWA ACADEMY OF SCIENCES. 



is calculated to still further deceive by a simulation of a flower nodding in the 

 breeze?" 



1 may add that further observations on the same species convinced me that my 

 explanation was correct. 



Mr. Charles W. Beckham, in a paper published a year or two later (which I am 

 unfortunately unable to find), has the following to say in relation to the common 

 *' Kingbird " or " Bee Martin:" 



"Several years ago I saw one of these birds occupying an exposed perch on a 

 pear tree in bloom about which many bees were darting. Several times I observed 

 that the bird caught the insect without leaving his perch, by quickly turning his 

 head and grabbing them. My attention being thoroughly aroused, I noticed that 

 many of them seemed to fly directly toward him, the majority seeming to * shy off ' 

 at a shjrt di!^tance and change their course, but very few that came within reach 

 escaped him. The question naturally suggests itself: Did the thrifty hymenoptera 

 mistake the fully displayed orange-red crown (I could see that the crest was erected) 

 for a flower? "^ 



Mr. Beckham also quotes my own obsetvations on Muscivora mexicania above 

 referred to. 



From that time to this there has been little attention paid to the matter, as far 

 as I can ascertain. The later writers such as Wallace and Poulton have ignored 

 the question entirely, although they recognize similar phenomena in regard to 

 animals, and have grouped them together for purposes ot discussion. 



Wallace says:- 



" Besides these insects which obtain protection through their resemblance to 

 the natural objects among which they live, there are some whose disguise is not 

 used for concealment, but is a direct means of securing their prey by attracting 

 them within the enemy's reach." 



"Only a few cases of this kind of coloration have yet been observed, chiefly 

 among spiders and mantidse; but no doubt if attention were given to the subject 

 in tropical countries many more would be discovered." 



Poulton in his "Colors of Animals," says: 



"Special aggressive resemblance sometimes does more than hide an animal 

 from its prey; it may even attract the latter by simulating the appearance of some 

 object which is of especial interest or value to it." ^ 



Mr. Poulton cites the case of the Asiatic lizard which is colored like the sand on 

 which it lives. A fold of skin at the corner of the mouth is red in color and is 

 "produced into a flower-like shape exactly resembling a little red flower which 

 grows in the sand." This the lizard successfully uses as a decoy for catching its 

 insect food. 



Beddard is the only recent writer, so far as I have been able to discover, that 

 alludes in any way to alluring colors among birds. After speaking of the alluring 

 coloration of the lizard "fishing frog," etc., mentioned by Poulton. he adds: 



" It is said that the brightly colored crests of many birds act in the same 

 way as a lure. Here of course there can be no question of any special resemblance 

 to a flower."^ 



And with this casual allusion Mr. Beddard leaves the question without discua- 



1 Quoted by me from Standard Natural History, Vol. IV, p. 499. 

 ^"Darwinism," p. 210. 

 3" Colors of Animals," p. 72. 

 * "Animal Coloration," p. 188. 



