Peacocks, Puffer Fish, and Push-Ups: How Animals Show Off
A male peacock's tail can spread into a fan of over 200 feathers, each one shimmering blue and green in the sun. It takes real energy to grow and carry that tail around — so why would evolution favor something so big and impractical? The answer is that animals often "talk" without making a single sound, using visual displays instead.
What You'll Learn
- What a visual display is and why animals use them - Real examples of displays used for attracting mates, defending territory, and warning of danger - The difference between a display aimed at the same species and one aimed at predators - How to identify a visual display when observing animals
Displays for Attracting a Mate
Peacocks fan their tails and shake them to catch a peahen's attention — scientists have found that peahens tend to choose males with more eyespots in their tail feathers. Anole lizards do something similar with a colorful throat flap called a dewlap, flashing it open and closed like a tiny flag. These displays cost energy and can even attract predators, but they succeed because they honestly signal that the animal is healthy enough to afford the risk.
Displays for Defending Territory
A gorilla defending its territory will stand tall, beat its chest with cupped hands, and sometimes charge a few steps before stopping — a display meant to look intimidating without an actual fight. Real fights are dangerous for both animals, so a loud, big display often settles the argument before anyone gets hurt. Male fiddler crabs wave one giant oversized claw to warn other males away from their burrow.
Displays That Warn Predators Away
When threatened, a puffer fish gulps water to inflate into a spiky ball nearly twice its normal size within seconds, making it too big and dangerous-looking to swallow. A frill-necked lizard snaps open a wide ruff of skin around its neck and opens its mouth to look much larger and scarier than it really is. These are called deimatic displays — sudden displays designed purely to startle or intimidate a predator.
Biologists call costly displays like the peacock's tail "honest signals" — because only a genuinely healthy, well-fed animal can afford to grow and maintain something so large and showy, the display itself proves fitness.
Match the animal to its visual display and its purpose.
Terms
Definitions
Drag terms onto their definitions, or click a term then click a definition to match.
Why do scientists call the peacock's tail an "honest signal"?
A puffer fish inflating into a spiky ball when threatened is an example of what kind of display?
Watch a pet cat arch its back and puff its fur when startled — that's a deimatic display too, making the cat look bigger and more dangerous than it really is.
Animal Display Field Notes
Choose three animals (from a nature video, a zoo visit, or a pet at home) and observe them for signs of a visual display. For each one, write down: what the animal did, what you think the display was for (mating, territory, or warning a predator), and what effect it likely had on the animal watching it.
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