Peter Forbes - Dazzled and Deceived: Mimicry and Camouflage

also by Peter Forbes

The Gecko's Foot: How Scientists are Taking a Leaf from Nature's Book

Copyright 2009 Peter Forbes

The right of Peter Forbes to be identified as the author of this Work has been asserted by him.

All rights reserved. This book may not be reproduced in whole or in part, in any form (beyond that copying permitted by Sections 107 and 108 of the U.S. Copyright Law and except by reviewers for the public press) without written permission from the publishers.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Forbes, Peter, 1947

Dazzled and deceived: mimicry and camouflage / Peter Forbes.

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-0-300-12539-9 (alk. paper)

1. Mimicry (Biology) 2. Camouflage (Biology) I. Title.

QH546.F66 2009

578.4'7dc22

2009023577

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

For Diana

Plates

Plate from Henry Walter Bates's Contributions to an insect fauna of the Amazon Valley. Lepidoptera: Heliconidae, Transactions of the Linnean Society, 1862, 23, pp. 495566.

Heliconius melpomene and passion flower. Author's photograph.

Rainforest. Photo courtesy of Hartwig Dell'mour; Bates, Wallace and Darwin portraits in public domain.

Orchid mantis. Photo Daniel Heuclin/NHPA/Photoshot.

Papilio troilus caterpillar. Photo courtesy of Thomas Eisner, Cornell University.

Swallowtail butterflies. Photo Natural History Museum, London.

Bird-dropping spider. Photo courtesy of Neil Hewett.

Gunboat HMS Kildangan, 1918. Imperial War Museum, London.

Abbott H. Thayer, Peacock in the Woods, study for book Concealing Coloration in the Animal Kingdom, 1907. 2004. Photo Smithsonian American Art Museum/Art Resource/Scala, Florence.

Andr Mare, Le Canon de 280 camoufl. Fonds Andr Mare/Archives IMEC.

Pablo Picasso, Woman with Pears (Fernande), 1909. Florene M. Schoenborn Bequest. 827.1996. By permission of DACS. Digital Image (2003) The Museum of Modern Art, New York/Scala, Florence.

Mantis Pseudocreobotra wahlbergii. Photo courtesy of Malcolm Edmunds.

Woodcock chicks photographed by Hugh Cott. Photo courtesy of Cambridge University Museum of Zoology.

Vladimir Nabokov chasing butterflies, 1958. Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images.

Lobster moth larva. Photo Robert Thompson/NHPA/Photoshot.

Kallima (leaf). Photo John Shaw/NHPA/Photoshot.

HMS Belfast. Author's photograph.

Gun camouflaged by H. B. Cott. Glasgow University Archive Services.

Dummy railhead at Misheifa, Egypt, 19412. Imperial War Museum, London.

Peter McIntyre, Camouflage dugouts, NZ Division HQ at Baggush, 13 March 1942. Photo courtesy of the Archives New Zealand/Te Rua Mahra o te Kawanatanga Wellington Office [AAAC 898, NCWA 321].

Operation Sunshield, WO 201/2841. National Archives, Kew.

Bombardier beetle. Photo courtesy of Thomas Eisner and Daniel Aneshansley, Cornell University.

Human warning signs. Author's montage.

Miriam Rothschild working on experiments in her laboratory, 1956. Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images.

Crab spider and bee. Photo courtesy of Ron Oldfield and Marie Herberstein.

).

Butterfly wingspot gene action. Photo courtesy of Sean B. Carroll.

Heliconius cydno, melpomene and heurippa. Photos courtesy of Mauricio Linares.

Map of Heliconius hybridisation. Photos courtesy of Mauricio Linares.

The Indo-Malaysian mimic octopus. Photo courtesy of Roger Hanlon.

Rock pocket mice. Photo courtesy of Michael Nachman.

Coral snake. Photo courtesy of David Pfennig.

Scarlet kingsnake. Photo courtesy of David Pfennig.

Figures

Some of Henry Walter Bates's mimetic butterflies. The top row are whites (Leptalis), which mimic the Ithomias in the next row. The middle white demonstrates how far the mimics have diverged from the typical form. Row 3 shows Leptalis mimicking other forms of Heliconidae (Row 4).

A Dennis-rayed postman butterfly (Heliconius melpomene) and its passion flower host plant.

The pioneers of mimicry and its role in evolution, against a rainforest background: Henry Walter Bates, Alfred Russel Wallace and Charles Darwin.

The Malaysian orchid mantis eating a fly lured by the orchid.

The snake's-head warning pose of the spicebush swallowtail caterpillar, Papilio troilus.

Four different mimicking female forms of the swallowtail butterfly Papilio dardanus, bred from a single brood. The parent is the lone butterfly at the top; the left-hand columns are the toxic models and the right-hand the mimicking swallowtails.

A bird-dropping spider (Celaenia excavata) on a mangosteen tree in Cooper Creek Rainforest, Queensland, Australia.

The gunboat HMS Kildangan in dazzle camouflage, 1918.

Abbott Thayer's Peacock in the Woods (1907), painted to suggest that the bird is camouflaged against woodland scenery.

Andr Mare's sketch of a cubistic camouflaged gun in the First World War.