thebirdsofparadise.org is a resource for information about the evolution and natural history of the avian family Paradisaeidae and website of Edwin Scholes III. All content on this site is licensed under at Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 License.

dedicated to scientific understanding and global appreciation of bird of paradise biodiversity

"...birds of paradise raise difficult questions, questions that penetrate to the very foundation of our biological theories.  How can natural selection favor, one might almost say permit, the evolution of such conspicuously bizarre plumes and displays?  How can it permit such 'absurd exaggerations', as one is almost tempted to call them?  How can it happen that apparently closely related species and genera differ so drastically in their habits and colorations?"

                                                                                    -Ernst Mayr, 1969

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