courtship displays of ostriches
Courtship Displays of Ostriches I. ... This work obviously resulted as part of a much broader analysis of comparative behavior seen amongst Ostriches that was encouraged by the assigning of this project. Ostriches are commonly characterized as being the largest (flightless) living bird, a characteristic they share with the emu, rhea, and cassowary (reviewed in Sell 1993). ... In terms of breeding and growth, mating takes place after a brief courtship display. ... These displays given by the Struthio Camelus, might be used in the context of exhibiting a foraging behavior, a mobbing behavior, or even a courtship behavior. ... Displays that are used for foraging behavior should be produced during times when a small amount of food is made available somewhere on these Ostriches’ territories. Displays that are being used as a form of mobbing behavior on the other hand should be demonstrated in times when food is made available to a related group of Ostriches and other Ostriches outside their spectrum of relatedness, are seeking to ensue that food. As a result of this, we should see a physical ganging up of several Ostriches on these intruders and predators. Finally if these displays are a means of exhibiting courtship, then we should see these types of movements not only when females are around, but also when females are ready for copulation. If this prediction is correct, then we should see the two Ostriches come together and mate following these displays. ... In addition to placing limited amounts of food and water into these corrals, we also made sure that ostriches of different genotypic family’s were placed amongst a group of genotypic related Ostriches; it is worth noting that the owner of this breeding ground had these Ostriches individually tagged to indicate both their quality and their relatedness to the other Ostriches. Finally the last thing we did was set up a number of different conditions and environments for these Ostriches all of course with the same amount of food and water for each one of them. ... Furthermore we tried to keep a good distance out of sight so that we ourselves would not provoke such a display from these Ostriches and as a result eliminate potential misleading factors. ... Results Decreasing food supply within the corral did not increase nor result in the type of movement that was being sought after amongst these groups of Ostriches especially when there was an all male group or an all female group.