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The primary subtractive colours of cyan, magenta, and yellow can be mixed to create all the colours of the rainbow. For our Queer Edition, I’m gifting you birdies proudly displaying these colours.
Cyan – Superb Fairywren (Malurus cyaneus)
A recently-published study, ‘Personality predicts song complexity in superb fairy-wrens’, reveals that superb fairywrens’ beautiful songs hold tiny clues into their personalities. Exploratory individuals sang with more element types – perhaps learned from a variety of teachers from their travels. Also, more aggressive birds sang with fewer syllables. Baby fairywrens, still in their eggs, learn distinct songs from their mothers. After they hatch, they use this song to ask for food, showing the strength of their family connection. Language is integral to building community, identity, and relationships for both these little fairywrens and for queer folk.
Magenta – Pink Cockatoo (Cacatua leadbeateri)
Pink cockatoos are simply fabulous! Every other species in its genus (Cacatua) is almost completely white. However, the pink cockatoo has retained the ability to deposit diluted pigment dyes in its body plumage, resulting in their signature pink. Pink cockatoos rely on large woodland expanses, especially old-growth conifers and eucalyptus for tree hollows to nest in. To strengthen and maintain bonds with each other, pink cockatoos engage in (the common bird behaviour of) allopreening with their flockmates. Like many queers, this queen thrives in a niche environment with a small, close-knit social group, full of friends who would be happy to help dye the hard-to-reach parts of their hair.
Yellow – Eastern Yellow Robin (Eopsaltria australis)
The genus name of Eastern Yellow Robins (Eopsaltria) means “dawn-singer”. As babies and fledglings, these robins have brown, streaky feathers to keep them camouflaged and safe. As they mature into bright yellow, they experience a scruffy, in-between stage. Queers often have a difficult time finding styles and expressions that suit them as they grow up. Gender nonconformity, trans experiences, and being stuck between “desperate for queer community to know I’m one of them” and fear of discrimination or outing oneself, make this journey a long and awkward one. Eventually, all of us get a new dawn (or dawns!) of self-expression that is true to who we were always meant to be.
Written by Ali Spanevello
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