ANSWERS TO GO with Susan Smith
Q. I started visiting the San Marcos City Cemetery when I was searching for uncrowded places to walk. I always see deer and squirrels. Recently, I happened on a peacock there. Its bright tail feathers were dragging so far behind its body. It made me wonder if peacocks have been changed by selective breeding? Or are they the product of a natural process?
A. The National Geographic’s online article on peacocks directly answers this question: “Peafowl such as the blue peacock have been admired by humans and kept as pets for thousands of years. Selective breeding has created some unusual color combinations, but wild birds are themselves bursting with vibrant hues.”
Let’s turn to books about peacocks on our juvenile nonfiction shelves. According to author Ruth Berman, peacocks are a type of pheasant.
Let’s confirm that. “The World Book Encyclopedia” groups both pheasants and peacocks in the scientific family Phasianidae. The members of this family are heavy birds that live on the ground: peacocks, pheasants, partridges, junglefowl, chickens, turkeys and Old World quail.
Back to Berman’s book. Peacocks weigh about 10 pounds. Males can be 6-8 feet long, including 4-6 feet of colorful feathers.
There are three species of peafowl: The Congo, the green and the Indian peafowl. The Indian peafowl is also called the blue or common peafowl. This the species most often found in zoos.
In the wild, peafowl must keep watch for predators. They fly into the trees to get away from tigers, leopards and jackals. At night, they typically roost on branches of trees. Peafowl are polygamous; a “harem” includes one male and four to six peahens.
However, trees aren’t always the safest place to be. Peafowl must also keep watch for a flying predator, the Indian hawk-eagle. To evade these, peafowl dash for cover under bushes or into forest undergrowth.
Peacocks are predators as well as prey. They are omnivores, eating almost anything they can find. That includes other animals, including the occasional cobra, according to Berman.
Additional source: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/birds/ group/peacocks.
