Getting Kinky: Red-necked Phalaropes
Among phalaropes, small oceanic shorebirds, polandry rules.
Red-necked Phalarope Female
Polyandry is sexual role reversal: the female, shown here, is much more colorful, slightly larger, and after laying her eggs abandons the nest. The smaller, drabber male is left to incubate the eggs and brood the young unassisted. The female will drive other females away from her mate, but only until the eggs are laid.
This female is a Red-necked Phalarope. Alaska also has Red Phalaropes, and rarely, Wilson’s Phalarope. The Red-necked is the smallest of the North American phalaropes, at just 18-20 centimeters.
Red-necked Phalarope females are also polygynous. They will breed with several males if they have the chance.
These are oceanic birds, and famous among birders for their behavior. They swim very quickly in tight circles, to draw their small prey up from a few inches down. They look like windup toys. Hyperactive, highly energetic, they can be identified at a distance by behavior alone.
Like Alaska’s sea ducks, there are primarily ocean birds, coming ashore in the far north to breed. Their sexual role reversal has made them better-studied than a lot of their cousins, but their winter habits and habitat are still poorly understood.
But for WC, they are a pretty, elegant grace note on on alpine ponds.
Love reading your posts–especially these birdy ones
This one touches subjects I happen to know a fair bit about (phalaropes and their behavior), so I feel a small need to point out a couple of corrections. Polyandry isn’t exactly sexual role reversal. What you describe in that paragraph is reverse sexual dimorphism (mostly the physical attributes) and sex role reversal (that the male incubates and raises the chicks alone). Polyandry is when one female mates with more than one male (from the Greek poly = many, andry = males). Polygyny is when one male mates with multiple females. I seem to recall Doug Schamel talking about how RNPH aren’t *really* polyandrous in that they don’t guard multiple males and don’t always mate with more than one in a breeding season. But I can’t recall all the details (must be getting old).
Thanks for all the awesome reading!
aswingley
June 18, 2012 at 2:41 pm
WC relied upon Birds of North America for his comments:
But WC knows aswingley to be a recovering ornithologist, and defers to her expertise. Apologies to readers for any over-simplification.
/WC
Wickersham's Conscience
June 18, 2012 at 3:12 pm