# Green and Purple Necks



## kingdizon (Jan 14, 2013)

I was reading about the iridescent shine of colors in pigeon necks,and found out WHY they shine,but couldn't find out WHY they have them,to what purpose does it serve?... I was thinking maybe the different colors or amount of color served some sort of function besides being flashy for mates. Maybe a tie to intelligence or libido or something?Like maybe green ties to some form of intelligence or dominance, and purple ties to etc etc and vice versa... Any thoughts on this??


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## NZ Pigeon (Nov 12, 2011)

I don't think the amount of irredesence has much to do with personality traits or any other traits, As you said, It helps with seduction and I also suspect it may be how the birds tell each other apart in the flock, Kinda like our fingerprints.


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## kingdizon (Jan 14, 2013)

NZ Pigeon said:


> I don't think the amount of irredesence has much to do with personality traits or any other traits, As you said, It helps with seduction and I also suspect it may be how the birds tell each other apart in the flock, Kinda like our fingerprints.



Like Fingerprints! I didn't even think of that and i does make a lot of sense since pigeons see in color and ultraviolet light!!. Thanks a ton NZ Pigeon!!


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## NZ Pigeon (Nov 12, 2011)

Its not backed up with any fact, just a thought that sprung up from your question. Could be worth looking into tho.


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## kingdizon (Jan 14, 2013)

NZ Pigeon said:


> Its not backed up with any fact, just a thought that sprung up from your question. Could be worth looking into tho.


I just was looking for a thread on it here and i couldn't find one. And there aren't any good internet resources for it that i know of..


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## navamanas (Mar 17, 2016)

Kind of late, but never hurts to add more info to a posting... Humans are trichromats, with the capacity to distinguish approximately one million discrete hues. Pigeons, on their other hand, are pentachromats. A pentachromat is capable of distinguishing up to 10 billion colors.

That's like comparing 1850's photography on a silver plate vs the best photography of some future point in time.

Two of the colors that they see are UV-A and UV-B. Basically, for all of the scientific guesses we can make about their vision and what it looked like, we have absolutely no idea. It's like someone who was born without eyes trying to imagine whay it must be like to see.

That should give you some idea of what their colors that we see must look like to them - plus more color hues that we have no inkling about.


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