To the question Why does the peacock have such a wonderful tail? Why does he need it? given by the author Lenzel the best answer is Peacocks (Pavo Linnaeus) - a genus of large birds from the pheasant subfamily, pheasant family, order Galliformes. The elongated tail of peacocks is flat, while most pheasants have a roof-shaped tail.

Thanks to its lush, fan-shaped ocellated “tail,” the peacock is known as the most beautiful bird among Galliformes.
We often hear the expressions: “Proud as a peacock” or “Smug as a peacock.”

They arose because it seems to everyone that the peacock gets great pleasure from showing off its magnificent tail and wonderful feathers.

There are many interesting things associated with this majestic spectacle. Firstly, only males do this. Females do not have such beautiful feathers.

The male peacock shows off in front of the female, and he shows off his beauty to her alone.
All males do this during the mating period. The peacock shows off its feathers, attracting the attention of the female.

He performs a dance, convincing the female that he is the most beautiful.

Most people believe that the magnificent feathers make up the peacock's tail. But it's not actually a tail.

These feathers belong to the lower part of the body and back. The tail is behind these feathers and supports them.

The peacock has been known to people and has amazed them with its beauty since ancient times. The Greeks and Romans considered it a sacred bird. But during the Roman Empire, this bird was used as a food product.

The peacock is native to India and southeast Asia. There are two types of peacocks, they are relatives of pheasants.

There is no more beautiful bird on earth than the peacock.
In flight, the peacock looks like a comet, and its fantastic dance is simply inimitable. The historical homeland of the bird of paradise is India. Hindus believed that after death, a person’s soul turns into a peacock and in this guise goes to heaven. In no other country in the world are such ancient connections between birds and local peoples observed. In 1963, the Indian government made the blue peacock the national symbol of the country.
In Buddhist mythology, the bird is a symbol of compassion and vigilance. The highest honors were given to the peacock by the Mughal emperor Shahjahan. According to his order, a Peacock Throne studded with precious stones was built. It was a unique and fabulous example of filigree art in its beauty and richness. It took 7 years to build.
The throne dazzled with its beauty and the shine of precious stones. Over the course of a century, the Peacock Throne became the most prestigious symbol.
Many estate owners keep peacocks instead of guards. Because the bird is sensitive and better than any dog ​​and CCTV cameras. If he notices a stranger, he immediately screams wildly. It can scare you to death. The bird of paradise was definitely unlucky with its voice.

The peacock's tail is one of the most beautiful phenomena in the animal kingdom. However, important narcissistic birds need them not only for beauty. It turns out that peacocks use their main advantage to reproduce loud, low-frequency sounds, those that are inaudible to the human ear. Thus, according to scientists, the decibels emitted by a peacock’s tail can be comparable to the sound of a speeding car.

Infrasonic noise using a tail

A study conducted by Angela Freeman and James Hare from the University of Manitoba showed that peacocks easily perceive and respond to infrasonic noises made using their tails. At the same time, humans are unable to perceive infrasound as a potential signal, which is why we were unable to hear the peacock “roll call.” The question arises: how did scientists come to the idea of ​​studying this problem?

Interesting behavior of a peacock at the zoo

James Hare's experiment was prompted by seeing the strange behavior of a peacock at the zoo. The scientist noticed that the bird was pressing its beautiful tail against the concrete wall. And if at first Khare did not understand why the bird needed to carry out such manipulations, then soon the scientist had an epiphany.
This huge tail was strikingly reminiscent of an ordinary satellite dish. What if the peacock was listening to some unknown sounds in this way? The matter remains small. It was necessary to select a group of birds, as well as equip themselves with devices capable of detecting low-frequency sounds.

Progress of the experiment

Freeman and Hare observed the behavior of 46 individuals, including both males and females. Curiously, when interacting with each other, the peacock feathers on their tails indicated a characteristic vibration. This can only be compared to the rustling of grass in the wind.
However, recordings showed that the sounds made by the birds ranged between 70 and 108 decibels. Despite the fact that the birds spent a lot of time in active movement, walking or running, scientists noticed one interesting detail. Males necessarily sent a response to the sounds made by their opponents.

How do birds hear infrasound?

It remains unclear how peacocks themselves can detect infrasound. Scientists know that some bird species detect low-frequency sounds using their own legs. However, such a low-intensity sound that the peacocks made during the experiment disproves this theory. Therefore, Angela Freeman suggested that the peacock’s inner ear is quite capable of distinguishing infrasounds. The correct shape of the structure of the inner ear may well indicate this.

Conclusion

To some people, the production of low-frequency sounds by peacocks may seem like a pointless endeavor. However, in the wild, this feature takes on a distinct meaning. The male must guard his territory, and when he hears an approaching rival, he must immediately announce his presence. Under natural conditions, peacocks live in impenetrable jungles or dense subtropical forests. Birds often cannot immediately discern their opponent. That is why piercing muffled sounds help them navigate in space so much.

Peacocks are the largest representatives of the gallinaceae order, however, unlike their relatives, they, namely the males, are distinguished by their extraordinary beauty.

They gained great popularity due to their long feathers, which open in the form of a fan in the tail area.

Let's consider what these feathers are, as well as in what situations these birds “spread their tail.”

How does a peacock spread its tail and is it a tail?

Anyone who has ever seen these beautiful birds knows that they have a beautiful tail that trails behind them like a train. However, few people know that large and dense feathers, painted in bright colors, are not actually a tail.

Ornithologists call this part the rump; it grows from the back of the male. The tail is located behind the bright feathers, it serves as support for the “fan” in a loose position and looks completely opposite.

Depending on the type of bird, the color of the rump is blue or green, but there are specimens with golden or white plumage. In the center of each feather there is a bright eye. The feathers are large and dense, and can reach up to 160 cm in length. When opened, the “fan” opens up to 300 cm in width.

Reasons for spreading feathers

In the process of observing these birds, ornithologists have identified several reasons as a result of which peacocks spread their beautiful “tails”. Let's look at them.

Did you know? After the female has given her consent to the union, the peacock turns its back to her. Only experts know that it is by the short tail feathers and rear part that one can determine the age of the male, his state of health and strength, which is what the female does.

Mating season

Most are sure that such beauty is given to the male solely to attract females to begin their life together. The peacock spreads its “fan” and begins to dance around the chosen one, rustling its plumage and freezing in spectacular poses.

Repelling enemies

During the mating season, each bird wants to occupy the most advantageous place. Having decided on a companion, the male wants her to be in the best conditions. To achieve this, he often has to sort things out with other peacocks and compete with them.

The conflict is resolved by showing off the splendor of one's tail until the enemy retreats.

Distracting a Predator

The bird's bright fan is also a means of distracting predators. When they come close to the nest, the peacock, with the help of beautiful plumage, distracts predators and takes them far from the location of the female with eggs or chicks.

Important!In some countries, it is believed that keeping peacock feathers at home will bring bad luck.

Communication with relatives

Few people know that the rustling of feathers is also a way of communication between peacocks. It turns out that when the angle of inclination of the feathers changes and they move slightly, infrasound is emitted, with the help of which birds talk.

Does a female peacock have a tail?

Since we already know that the long feathers that distinguish male peacocks from females are not the tail, the question is illogical. These birds, regardless of gender, have a small tail, but it is short and inconspicuous.

In the animal world there are certain laws according to which the species lives and develops. These laws were once studied by Darwin and reflected in his world-famous theory of natural selection. According to this theory, within each animal species there is a natural, natural selection of individuals most adapted to survival. Among the males there is a struggle for the female, in order to be chosen by her or admitted to her. During mating games, males fight among themselves, measure their strength, and the winner gets the honorable right to continue their gene pool.

This happens in almost all animals: deer fight with their antlers, sea lions with their chests and flippers. Even crayfish swing their claws in the fight for the female.

But there are exceptions. For example, peacocks. During the mating season, male peacocks do not fight for the female. How do they compete? It’s very simple and beautiful - peacocks spread their tails in the form of huge fans, thereby attracting the attention of the female. The larger and wider the tail, the greater the chance of being chosen. Female peacocks are deprived by nature: they do not have such luxurious tails. Maybe that's why they are so greedy for the beauty that males show them?

Zoologists have long noticed this feature of peacock behavior, but for a long time they could not explain why and how the female makes her choice. At first they thought that the male peacock, having spread his tail, blocked all other competitors with it, and the female simply did not see them. It turned out that this was not the case. It is impossible to close all the males, no matter how gorgeous your tail is. Zoologists have noticed that the female invariably chooses the male with the largest tail. She seems to compare the males with each other and goes to the one with the bigger tail.

It is foolish to believe that a female peacock has a sense of beauty. In fact, after carefully observing the life of peacocks, scientists noticed that the tail of male peacocks grows very slowly. The older the peacock, the larger the tail. So does the female choose more mature males? And if so, why? The point is also that the peacock is an attractive bird for many predators. In the animal world there are many who want to eat peacock meat. Therefore, male peacocks rarely live to be three years old, becoming prey to predators. You have to be really dexterous and fast to avoid being eaten. To manage to grow a long tail, a peacock needs to be very resourceful. The long tail of the peacock is proof of its greatest adaptability to survival on the landscape. The longer the tail, the older, and therefore more agile, the peacock, the more adapted to survival its offspring will be. Therefore, the female naturally chooses just such a male.

But the peacock needs a tail not only to attract a female. The tail helps him deceive the predator. The predator is chasing a peacock and it already seems to him that he has caught up with the peacock, when in fact, he only grabbed it by the tail. The peacock slips out of the predator's clutches, leaving him with one or two feathers. He lost his feathers, but saved his life. And the feathers will grow.

How is it with people

For a woman to pay attention to a man, he is ready to do a lot. After all, it is also very important for him to pass on his gene pool to the future. No less important than for any deer, crayfish or peacock. Of course, for people everything is significantly complicated by culture and civilization, but relations between the sexes are still largely based on animal instincts. And even when we are not talking about direct procreation, a partner and his qualities are an important indicator for us, not just from some far-fetched tastes and preferences.

It happens, of course, that men literally fight over a woman, but this is still not how we choose a mate. A woman, by nature, is responsible for the correct choice of a partner before her future offspring. Therefore, she is just as inclined to choose among men the one who is most adapted to survival, and who is also best able to take care of her and their future children.

This is the basis of her unconscious choice, even though she may actually decide to never have children and be completely financially secure. However, the very rationalization of why she likes that man and not that one will one way or another be rooted in these basic factors; all the foundations of attractiveness are built on them.

But of course, with people everything is much more complicated than with animals. Animals differ from each other in physical characteristics, but are identical in their internal content - mental structure. They have no consciousness as such, all their behavior is regulated exclusively by basic desires and works like a well-oiled mechanism in which there is no room for conscious choice and preference. Therefore, they do not have what we call actual thinking, which is why among animals there is no particular difference in mental abilities between individual individuals.

We humans are very different from the animal world in this sense. How? We are not animals and are guided not only by the simplest desires, but we also have complicated, additional desires. What we call consciousness, thinking, is what provides our thoughts on how to realize these desires. System-vector psychology of Yuri Burlan identifies eight main types of thinking, vectors, that is, types of basic sets of certain properties and corresponding desires.

How do these additional desires make choosing a partner more difficult?

When a woman chooses a man, she is helped in this by the attraction she experiences. Attraction occurs when she smells a man's scent. It's not the smell of sweat or cologne, it's something completely different. Attraction is caused by special molecules called pheromones. They are not perceived by us as a smell in the usual sense of the word, they are unconsciously perceived odors that influence our subconscious in such a way that we either like the other person or not.

A man's choice is relatively simple, based solely on attraction. While a woman chooses a man based on two types of pheromones: attraction pheromones and ranking pheromones.

Every man carries pheromones of attraction naturally, and these pheromones have varying degrees of intensity depending on his libido. The most powerful libido, and accordingly, the strongest smell of attraction pheromones is in the carrier of the urethral vector - the natural leader standing at the head of the natural hierarchy. And the weakest libido and, accordingly, the least attractive smell of attraction pheromones in men with the skin vector.

To be successful with women, men with the skin vector strive to artificially “intensify” the smell of their pheromones. How? They follow the leader to the top of the hierarchy, trying to raise their social status, that is, to dominate. This allows them to compensate for the lack of scent from attraction pheromones with ranking pheromones. Therefore, men with the skin vector are very ambitious, striving for career growth, making money, in other words, they are trying with all their might to raise their social status - their rank.

A man with the skin vector strives to dominate, and this is reflected in his behavior. He will improve his status, pursue prestige and achieve success. But it's not that easy. The more developed the properties of the vector, the more a person is able to realize himself in society, the more he will be in demand and vice versa.

A man, a carrier of the skin vector, who has managed to realize the qualities given to him by nature, becomes more attractive to women. They are drawn to him unconsciously, sensing the scent of his attraction pheromones enhanced by the scent of ranking pheromones. We say about a developed, realized leather worker that he is a successful, self-confident person. Additionally, the leather worker’s high rank helps to emphasize his love for everything expensive and prestigious. An expensive car, a Swiss watch, an apartment in a prestigious area, clothes from famous fashion designers are the attributes of the prestige of a successful person.

And it happens that a man’s skin vector is not sufficiently developed, and then it is difficult for him to realize himself, since he lacks the necessary qualities to achieve success.

Unable to succeed, unable to dominate in content, such a leather worker tries to replace the lack of content with form. He surrounds himself with things that indicate his supposedly high social status. Such a man not only prefers, but also clearly demonstrates on himself everything that is expensive and can indicate wealth, his high position in society. He can spend all his money on creating the appearance of his success, surround himself with these external attributes, but at the same time, in fact, not have a penny to his name.

It also happens that an undeveloped leather worker nevertheless turns out to be able to obtain large sums of money. This money is usually obtained through dishonest means. After all, it is precisely such people, possessing the ingenuity and flexibility of thinking inherent in the skin vector, who, like no one else, are able to create and implement schemes with the goal of “making money” or “throwing a sucker.” But just having money does not make them successful people. You cannot deceive the unconscious, and with all the money a person was and remains what he is - insufficiently developed in his properties, without the “healthy” smell of pheromones.

This type of dominance is especially characteristic of our Russian urethral mentality. Why? Because our mentality implies a hierarchy, where it is especially important for a man with the skin vector to dominate. For comparison, in the West, society is more standardized, and there it is not customary to flaunt one’s wealth, thereby causing the envy of other people.

Be that as it may, when a man with the skin vector strives with all his might for success, making money, when he surrounds himself with expensive things, in fact, he thus strengthens his position relative to other men and increases his chances of getting a woman I chose him.

He does all this unconsciously. And in his mind it seems to him that he himself likes expensive things, that he himself wants to make a career. Why? He thinks that he is just such a person, not suspecting that in the depths of his psyche, he is driven by desires and aspirations set by his skin vector. And these desires are aimed only at raising one’s status (rank), increasing one’s chance of being chosen by a woman, thereby gaining the right to procreate, a chance to pass one’s gene pool into the future.

In other words, roughly speaking: all the show-off is because of women! What did you think?

The article was written based on training materials on system-vector psychology

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For many centuries, the peacock has been the most famous bird in the world. It is depicted on the coats of arms of countries, on company logos, paintings, mosaics and embroideries, mentioned in proverbs and sayings, and is revered in some countries as a religious shrine.

Only males have a beautiful tail

The peacock owes its popularity to its ability to spread its bright tail.

Why does a peacock open its tail? After all, there are no accidents in nature, and each feature has a specific purpose.

There are many misconceptions associated with the peacock's tail.

1. "The peacock opens its tail." No, the peacock reveals his tail feathers. This is where all the beauty of the bird of paradise lies. The tail itself is unremarkable: gray-brown in color, up to 50 cm long.
2. All peacocks have a beautiful tail. No, only males have it 07/12/2016 - 12:26. The peahen's tail is short (up to 40 cm), gray-brown in color. The female's color is unremarkable and allows her to camouflage herself in the grass and bushes.
3. With a long tail, it is difficult for a bird to move. This is wrong. Peacocks fly little and rarely: to spend the night in a tree and in case of unexpected danger. The rest of the time they walk or run, deftly maneuvering in the thick grass.
4. The tail is only needed to attract a female. This is only partly true. The peacock's tail is more than a trump card in mating games.

During the mating season, the peacock opens its tail and dances a complex wedding dance with its tail spread out.

Peacock Feather Facts

• The length of the uppertail feathers is up to one and a half meters.
• The width of the open tail is up to 3 meters.
• On average there are up to 170 “eyes” on feathers.

Why does a bird show its tail?

French and Canadian ornithologists studied the bird of paradise in its natural habitat for a long time to answer the question of why the peacock spreads its tail. They concluded that there are 4 reasons why a male uses his rich plumage:

1. Attracts a female. During the mating season, the peacock opens its tail and dances a complex wedding dance with its tail spread to please the peahen. After the female becomes interested, the male folds his tail feathers and turns his back to her. At this time, the peahen evaluates the condition of the male’s plumage: the number of feathers, their appearance, color and pattern. Thus, the female chooses the healthiest peacock to continue the race. That is, the tail and rump are an indicator of the health of the male. If the peahen agrees, she gives a sign to the male, he presents her with a treat as a gift, and mating occurs.
2. Scares off the enemy. During the mating season, when fighting for the attention of a female or in everyday life, peacocks sometimes arrange confrontations. They rarely end in battle. Males spread their tails and show themselves to the enemy in all their splendor. The male with the largest and brightest tail wins.
3. Distracts the predator. In the wild, the main enemies of peacocks are leopards and birds of prey. If an enemy approaches, the male opens his tail and distracts the predator’s attention from the female and the nest. When the leopard becomes interested, the peacock folds its tail and quickly runs into the thickets of grass or bushes, without slowing down. The peahen, meanwhile, has the ability to lead chicks to safety or camouflage itself in the nest thanks to its inconspicuous coloring.
4. Communicates at low frequencies. The sharp, unpleasant sounds that the peacock makes strongly contrast with its luxurious appearance. The bird rarely gives voice - in case of danger or when bad weather approaches. Until recently, it remained unclear how the peacock communicates with its relatives. Ornithologists, through long-term research, have established that peacocks communicate with each other using infrasound, which is not perceived by the human ear. The tail feathers are the main instrument for creating low-frequency sounds and an “antenna” for receiving infrasound.

The width of the open tail of a peacock reaches three meters

During the courtship dance, the male often changes the angle of his feathers: he holds them straight, bends them outward and inward, and slightly shakes his tail, vibrating the feathers. From the outside, it seems as if the peacock is showing off its tail from the most advantageous angle. But he does all this in order to send an infrasonic signal to the female and catch her response.

“During male confrontation, they also use fanned tails for infrasonic communication.”

Nature awarded peacocks with a magnificent tail feathers not for beauty, but solely for practical purposes. A beautiful tail for a peacock is a matter of survival and procreation. The bird of paradise, like no one else, knows what sacrifices beauty requires: due to their magnificent feathers, royal birds were on the verge of extinction in the 20th century and were listed in the International Red Book. But, despite this, the main enemy of peacocks is still poachers - hunters of bird of paradise feathers.