A disguised truck during the Battle of El Alamein. Disguise and camouflage supposedly played a major role, and so did artists, naturalists and biologists

Some of these people are very well-known, at least to biologists. The correspondence between Henry Walter Bates and Alfred Russel Wallace and their journey together and apart in the Amazons, and their pre-occupation with trying to explain why among such a diversity of butterflies (over 700 species), there were uncanny similarities between apparently unrelated species of butterflies makes for interesting reading.

The Viceroy butterfly (above) which is non-poisonous and "bland tasting" and potentially a prey is also avoided because it is similar to the toxic and bitter tasting Monarch butterfly (below) - one of the best known examples of Batesian mimicry

Here begins an interesting question that fascinated biologists on one side and inspired artists on the other. Many such models of mimicry are found in nature and our own Kallima is perhaps the best example, often unspottable among the leaf litter. Darwin and Bates had hypothesised based on their observations that the “odourless and palatable” Leptalis might be mimicking the boldly patterned and brightly coloured Heliconius, which advertises its bad taste with bright colours and patterns. Much before genes were known of, or even named such, the explanations and experiments to understand the evolution of mimicry progressed fast. Tempers ran high in those days – biologists even tasted a few Heliconius to prove their point, with a bitter taste in their mouth(!). One of these was Thayer, to whom Forbes dedicates at least two chapters to. Apparently, Thayer is the only(?) artist to have a law named after him – Thayer’s law of countershading. Thayer turns out to be a very interesting character. Suffering from what he himself called “Abbott’s pendulum”, he had terrible mood swings (because of his bipolar disorder) and the fact that these moods often caught him in the middle of passionate wartime advocacy did not help matters. His passion for countershading became so severe that he was publicly rubbished by (among others) Theodore Roosevelt. Here’s one such response to Roosevelt by Thayer.

The underside of the Orange Oakleaf, found in many parts of India is a superb example of disguise

 For my assertion that white on objects’ upper slopes, under an open starry sky without the moon or any artificial light far or near, is an absolute match for the sky, Col. Roosevelt can hardly find words to express his contempt, saying many things which must some day look very funny to him when he finds out his error.

It turns out that Thayer was extremely convinced that white upper coloration is one of the best camouflages to provide to anything in the sun. Roosevelt brought to this debate, his own hunting experience from African trips and indeed was invoking sexual selection arguments in days when it was out of fashion – as summarised by Norman Johnson here.

The countershaded bird on the right is not seen, as opposed to the "comouflaged" left one that is visible - From Thayer's experiments to prove countercolouration

The two world wars provided plenty of opportunity for biologists and artists to cross swords at war offices, where they invoked various laws and rules of nature to help hide ships or disguise buildings. A British artist, Norman Wilkinson has been credited with being the first to show how to hide ships using dazzle camouflage, although he had to win this recognition after a legal battle. His painting Plymouth harbour sank with the Titanic. Initially, devised to decrease ship damage from torpedo attacks from German U-boats, the coloration was inspired by the sort of patterns seen on zebras. Apparently, the discuption caused by the lines and patterns which breaks the shape of the object makes it very difficult to even predict which direction the object is moving making it difficult to target during wars. See this boat from Arnhem for example.  More recent work by marine biologists has confirmed similar observations in cuttlefish and other marine fauna.

The book has so many other colourful descriptions of colourful characters – people included. Peter Scott, John Cott, Jonathan Kerr and of course the “other” mimicry scientist (other than Bates), Fritz Muller, of the Mullerian mimicry fame. Interesting accounts of Vladamir Nabokov and his early history are also provided, as are the details of letter exchanges between Bates and Darwin. Hugh Bamford Cott is credited with coining the term “arms race” to denote the adaptations and counter adaptations such as in predator-prey who are engaged in a continuous shruggle of “bettering” the other. Cott’s explanation of mimicry and camouflage is indeed simple and elegant. He saw three main categories – concealment, disguise and advertisement. His application of these categories to explain a lot of observations across diverse species is apparently still the best available book on the topic – Adaptive cooluration in animals. The work of Miriam Rothschild, a code breaker for the top secret German Enigma code, based out of Bletchley Park, in unravelling the origin of the toxicity of many of the butterflies through exploring which plants they got it from in the first place. She found that the imperviousness of butterflies to the toxins they imbibe from plants, is species-specific; she found this through rather difficult experiments of feeding some plant substances to unsuspecting starlings. Madam Rothschild’s contributions are many – finding out the mechanism of jumping among flies, setting up Schizophrenia research fund, and campaigning for the legalisation of homosexuality – and in the meanwhile writing 350 papers on entomology and zoology!

All in all, an amazing book that sends the reader in multiple directions – there are many I did not pursue – the cubists and their role in this discourse for example. Amazing research and scholarship and no surprises in the book bagging many awards and good reviews. Peter Forbes’ Warwick memorial lecture “Science morphing into Art” is a good teaser if you are considering the book.

And on a lighter note, if you want to try some dazzle for your scooter, here’s how it will look. As one of the comments says, this could be one perhaps to “confuse the navel artillery”. :p

Anyways, neither are there any mosquito-rights activists, nor are things as simple as taking a leaf from malaria vector control and applying it in bird flu. Understandably, things are much more complex than that. In two posts to two different groups, I have shared my opinions with both interest groups – birdwatchers and public health professionals…….here is the birds edition, and soon to come the public health edition.

Just a few comments of mine especially in view of several discussions that I have been witness to in course of my study here. I just share below some of my thoughts for the general reader and may be writing on topics way out of the purview of our discussion group in hope that many birdwatchers would be interested in topics related to bird flu – an interesting situation that calls for a lot of inter-disciplinary work and understanding of concepts in biology, epidemiology, public health and veterinary science.

Sudheendra’s mail and Krishna’s and Deepa’s subsequent replies about Avian flu bring up many issues on avian flu that are hardly being considered. Sudheendra rightly points out the serious economic consequences of mass culling being undertaken in response to ‘declared’ cases of the flu in Orissa and Bengal. Many of the people involved here are small poultry owners for whom livelihood is a much more proximate concern than an unheard ‘flu’.

Flu is definitely not something to be taken lightly. As Krishna points out, if the virus does ‘cross-over’ to humans, the chances are only among the animal handlers, and that is exactly where the public health authorities must focus. It is also to be noted that until recently bird-human infection was not yet reported and it was only spreading among birds. But, the worldwide panic is because IF there is such a mutation that enables the flu to spread among people, it could take up the pandemic proportions that the world has seen before.

The thing about flu is that it is clinically….well…so insignificant! Fever, feeling of weakness, body pain, red eyes are symptoms that dont get reported. MOre so in the health system landscape that India has with a zillion private clinics, quacks, traditional healers and disgruntled and frustrated public health system. The reports we are getting now are the ones we could detect.

Flu viruses have the uncanny ability of sweeping across the world bringing about widespread deaths and then, suddenly disappearing. This has happened many times before. The classical example quoted is that of the Swine Flu epidemic in the US which is supposed to have killed over 20 million people over 4 months just in the US! Of course, the pandemic was worldwide, but you
can get numbers only for the US, UK and some other countries which did have such systems. Over 200,000 people are supposed to have died in this pandemic in UK. It took more lives than in the First world war. And then, suddenly Swine Flu vanished into thin air. Poof! I say this to emphasize the point that flu is a very real danger. The reason why it flares up so suddenly is
attributed to mutations.

Influenza is caused by a virus which are comparable to “a bad xerox machine inside a protein cover”, the xerox machine in this case referring to its genetic material. I call it bad because it lacks a particular ‘proof-reading’ mechanism that other living things have and hence there are
no ‘errors’ when for example our own skin cells multiply in a healing wound. If our cells did not have a good way of keeping our genetic material intact during division, then we would all be doomed! But, for the virus this is quite an advantage, and hence through mechanisms called drifts and shifts, the virus keeps changing its protein clothing, which is what enables our immune system to identify them. So, how does the human immune system grapple with a virus that keeps changing its appearance……It cant!…which is why, HIV and many other such viruses pose a great threat for vaccines. We would have to keep making vaccines for every new dominant appearance (strain) of the virus. IN simple language what I spoke about here is recognized as Genetic drifts and Genetic shifts. Drifts are minor changes occuring in the protein coat of the virus that leads to failure of vaccines and sometimes, major catastrophes, such as the Spanish Influenza Pandemic in the spring of 1918 which is supposed to have killed anywhwere between 40-100 million people! Get ready for this one – The Spanish Flu strain was supposed to have been an avian virus that underwent a shift!

Coming back to avian flu, the present strain finds it very difficult to get transmitted from human to human. Still, over 300 worldwide deaths that have been reported today are mostly bird-human transmissions with a few rare ‘within family’ transmissions reported mostly again, within the family of the animal/poultry handlers. The virus strain causing the flu is called H5N1
which is the standard name for naming influenza viruses. H stands for one of the surface proteins on the virus that enables entry into cells, and N stands for an enzyme that enables the new virus particles to break out of the dying cell. Now, 4 sub-types of the avian flu virus are recognized. All
of them are deadly to birds, and can cause disease and death among humans. It is important to remember here that the virus presently is an AVIAN FLU virus and is being incidentally passed on to humans because of the way in which we have organized our poultry system! Wild birds, especially waterfowl are natural carriers of the virus, although, they are not as susceptible to
the disease as are the domestic birds. For eg. Russian vets are supposed to have drawn over 4000 samples of blood in Siberia with around 50 showing antibodies, which indicates active infection or past infection.

It is quite evident that migrant birds can carry these strains. But, it is important to note the following:

1) Birds carry several kinds of flu viruses and they have been doing so for zillions of years.

2) Wild birds themselves pose NO THREAT to any person directly. The only way is for them to pass on their infection to poultry birds, where the flu could spread like wildfire.

What we need to focus on is the situation within our poultry industry, handling of dead birds and a surveillance system that reports bird deaths in poultry houses. Moreover, awareness on this for animal handlers is extremely important. I find it quite ridiculous that may international bodies are calling for culling of wild birds. Such measures are not only scientifically untenable, they are also quite a schoolboy solution, I must say….a bit like trying to kill all mosquitoes to eradicate malaria!

What we must concentrate on is surveillance systems, awareness on animal handling and vaccine research. Prototypes of the vaccines are being reported. If the virus does acquire mutations that enable human-human transmission, it could definitely be catastrophic, else, it could just go away into the thin air like a million other strains of flu that we in the third world could never ever find document, let alone naming them after their surface proteins. India must’ve seen so many other previous outbreaks that were never documented.

Just a final word, Avian Flu is a disease that presents a lot of research opportunities. There could be many PhDs created. It creates good business opportunities, many patents, awards, paper presentations, conferences and well, sales of the vaccine will rake in millions…….it’s not the same
situation for diseases like Malaria, Kala-azar, Tuberculosis etc. which continue to kill millions of people across millennia….these are the neglected diseases that no one ever bothers about. There are no new vaccines being tried, and no new drug being developed for these diseases….there is
simply no ‘market’!!! An irony that avian flu gets so much attention.

Wonder how many of you got this far into my long rant at the end of a busy week here in cold, birdless Antwerp….most of the birds around my house are around where most of you are sitting. Who knows, maybe some of them carried the flu!!! I started the mail saying “…just a few comments”……

Some references for those who are interested:

Johnson, NP; Mueller, J (2002 Spring). “Updating the accounts: global
mortality of the 1918-1920 “Spanish” influenza pandemic.

J. D. Earn, J. Dushoff, S. A. Levin (2002). “Ecology and Evolution of the
Flu”. *Trends in Ecology and Evolution* 17: 334-340.

Bill Bryson (2003) A Short History of Nearly Everything. pp. 386-388

The wonder of this drug is that it is much sought after for the various kinds of pains, most often, arthritic pain. Moreover, recent precription practices of doctors show a remarkable bias towards diclo as compared to traditional painkillers. But, most importantly, it is quite inexpensive when compared to many others.

Changing prescription practices among doctors is a sisyphean task! Trust me, public health professionals have been trying for ages to bring in rational and evidence-based drug use, but to no avail. Unless, safer, and more importantly, more economical alternatives to vets is proposed and ACTIVELY pushed the ground situation is not likely to change at all. And this pushing has to happen, NOT THROUGH conservation groups but through medical reps! Catch any medical
professional listening to conservation groups!

Of course, all this is assuming that Diclo truely is the reason for the ‘vulture decline’. I really dont know if it is safe to assume that banning diclo would be of any help in Africa at all! Is there evidence for this?

If the future of vulture in India rests in fact on the effectiveness of the ban on diclofenac, then God save the Vulture! If at all, the vultures do manage to fight back a few years after the ban, we can rest assured that diclofenac never was the reason anyways! Cos, rarely have we ever achieved any ban in reality. ( Go to the nearest pharmacy to purchase any of the following ‘banned drugs’ – Analgin, Cisapride, Droperidol, Furazolidone, Piperazine etc…)

There is some sort of light at the end of the tunnel. I have pasted below the reply of the ‘artist’ I referred to in my earlier mail. The artist here is the doctor I work with, and he has been ‘seeing’ birds for a coupla‘ decades now. I presume his mail will more appropriately confuse Sudhee! As Guru adds, the mind-body problem is what I had in my mind (!) when I penned my reply. The seat of the mind has been quite a mystery for years. The realm of the answer has been classically left to philosophers and artists. However, it is those scientists who have stood at the shores of ‘science’ and looked beyond the oceans of art, that have seen the answer to everything.
I was just pondering on how science is relevant to the ‘artist birdwatcher’? Is it just enough then if we enjoy the whistle of a thrush and the cackle of a bulbul while not wondering on the hows, whys and whithers?

Consider an artist. A 20 year old man with a lot of ambition, and skilled as well (defining ‘skill’ is altogether another discussion!). He wants to take up landscape painting. Having been in Bangalore all his life, he does not get too much of the natural landscapes he likes. He initially wants some ‘mountain with sunset’ kind of subject to paint. A friend suggests BR hills and he goes there. He spends a day there and goes back to Bangalore with a painting. Which painting would be a true work of art (as they say!)…

1) Mountains with trees, and sun setting: Mountains are portrayed with a diffuse growth of trees and a huge expanse of forest is shown. While the painting itself is beautiful showing a vast expanse of forest, a magnifying glass would only show ‘trees with green leaves’!

2) The same mountains and trees and the expanse but, with an attention to detail…the Lianas hanging, the racquet-tailed drongos flying, the spot of the road (a nightjar for a trained eye!), the shadow of the cloud over the canopy, string of trees on the mountains with a plusher green(where the streams flow!), trees with bare bark near the water body (debarked by elephants!), a huge group of swifts overhead (strong monsoon winds are blowing!). This artist may not at all know what I have indicated in brackets, but his ‘work of art’ incorporates it. It is here that science meets art!

The artist here is like the tern we see or the cow that the doctor saw (refer the article below!) Where the cow or the tern never involve themselves in any ‘bheja fry’ like us, the true scientist-artist would. (Like it or not, we have a neo-cortex); And it is here that we see the meaning of birdwatching. Such should be our observations. In trying to see the angered tern or a ‘single racqueted‘ drongo, all of us have to look for a satisfying explanation. It is only that for some, this explanation lies in art and for others in science! And of course, the tern or the cow never really bothered, because they were the problem itself! (It is not the problem, but the solution that bothers us)

NB: I looked to S J Gould for some clarity. (Art Meets Science in The Heart of the Andes: Church Paints, Humboldt Dies, Darwin writes, and Nature Blinks in the Fateful Year of 1859 Pp 90-109 from “I Have Landed – The End of a Beginning in Natural History”, Stephan Jay Gould, 2002)

Dr. Sridhar’s reply:

Dear Prashanth,

//snip…Now let me add to the confusion. The word emotion is derived from its Latin ancestor ‘emovere‘ which means ‘to be disturbed’. So literally speaking, the bird was disturbed. To be disturbed is one of the essential qualities of “life”. In addition, emotion is the body’s response to life situations, preparing it to be “responsible”! Again, Responsibility literally means Ability to Respond adequately and appropriately from moment to moment. Coming back to emotions, it is a much earlier manifestation in evolutionary scheme, as the chemicals are released from the primitive reptalian brain and not from the much junior neo cortex. What the birds probably don’t do is to name the various emotions as we do . Our neo cortex constantly tries to name, find meaning where there they are probably not needed.We seem to complicate things in trying to find meaning.( philosophical ? uh?) So “life is constant Disturbance” and the beauty lies in constant Responsibility to the never ending Disturbance !!

I would like to tell you about a certain event that happened a few years ago, which has left a deep impression in my mind. When I was in the clinic, a herd of cows came into the campus. Soon they were being driven away. One of them while trying to get out, got entangled in the barbed wire fence and came down with a thud. I wanted to help it extricate its leg . When I went
near it , it started struggling more vigorously and the leg started bleeding. Hence I withdrew. The cow lay there helplessly, frothing from the mouth and the eyes were upturned and pitiable. Soon, another cow on the other side of the fence came near the ‘fallen’ cow, sniffed it and started
licking. Within a few seconds, the cow came alive and got up smoothly extricating its trapped leg and went away. Probably , I noticed a wide cascade of emotional expressions in the cows, raging from fear, helplessness and love and thankfulness. The animals did not take the trouble to name the emotions, nor did they care to thank! Who knows, after a while they might have locked horns over an inviting bull!

I can only marvel at nature and I think I will be a terrible failure to explain everything . I would rather be an artist!

Sudhee asked “…During my regular birding sessions……i encountered many water birds….encountered 3 River terns and One blackbellied tern…the river terns “tried to attack” me by making harsh screeching calls in flight, coming very close and taking sudden upflight, everytime i tried to go near the water body….the blackbellied tern was attacking the river tern without reasons..like the river tern was taking rest on the bank..this blackbellied tern tried to attack it from above..it did that several times! later when the river tern also got angry they had a chase where blackbellied tern with enormous speed was able to attack the river tern more fearlessly…..the river tern’s attitude of territory(?)awareness..or breeding resposiblities have not been given in salim ali…i even observed once a red wattled lapwing trying to attack a DOG when it was approaching (? ) its nest..the blackbellied terns’ attitude ignited a question in me …do birds have emotions..very basic emotions..like caring(love)..Fear..and Anger or those are only reflexes? can anybody enlight me more…NS?”

Your description is more indicative of a nesting colony of River Terns rather than ‘plain territoriality’. However, I wonder if the lake you talk about can accomodate breeding colonies of River Terns. Does it have open sand banks. Is it a perennial lake and was it big enough. The terns prefer sandy ‘river’ banks for nesting and they may be found nesting in colonies with Pratincoles or with other species of terns. Both the River and the Blackbellied being resident terns occupying almost similar niches, conflict over resource(nesting site, feeding site etc) would be a common occurence. Now coming to your Question on emotions and birds…Hmm…I think it is a question most asked and never adequately answered. Not answered adequately, not because of lack of information to answer them, but because of lack of belief. Such is our hobby (profession??) that it comes somewhere in the grey zone between art and science. I would divide birdwatchers into those with predominant artistic traits and those with predominant scientific traits. Where one says “Blessed are we to be able to appreciate natures beauty”, the other would attribute it to his trained eye! Where one experiences wonder and awe at the Peacock’s tail or the Minivet’s scarlet, the other sees Sexual Selection! Where one sees a remarkable plan and purpose in and eagle’s hunt, the other sees survival! Where one sees ‘love’ when two bulbuls cuddle, the other sees ‘breeding record’! Where one sees anger, the other sees ‘territorialiity’ And like you saw passion and aggresssion in the tern’s action, somebody else will see evidence of a nest and “nothing else”! And so, is the scientist better, because he knows so much more about the whys, hows and what nots? Well, that would be like comparing Alexander and Buddha! (There are no common standards for this comparison)
Yesterday evening during a walk, I was asked by somebody who has been watching(seeing!) birds for 11 years, whether, I could just look at them and not name them. It was then that I realised that I had compromised a lot on the artist front in arming myself scientifically. I realised that my mind said “Scarlet Minivet” when I saw one of the most wonderful birds flitting around and whistling. It will probably take some time to reawaken the part of me which does not conclude anything on seeing. So here is a lot of mumbo-jumbo instead of the answer to your question. Trust me, I have been there and have not found any answers. I am sure the above will help you in your journey to find the answer. Science is one route. It will give you all the explanations that perfectly fit your observations. But does that satisfy you. If you are now told that the terns are mere survival machines which are programmed to react the way they did under particular circumstances, would you be happy to take that answer, just because it is scientific?

Art is another. Just read a poem (I am sure somebody has ‘poetried’ on terns) and you will see that the artist is able to attribute numerous purposes and emotions to the tern’s actions. Read Jonathan Livingston Seagull and you will see how there can be a whole world of gulls with their
own beliefs and traditions. But, how can you prove it, you mind will ask! So, the question rings back. Did the tern have emotion? All we can do is only conjecture or write poetry. The truth is with the tern, and it does not want to tell you!