Bowerbirds are creative engineers! To attract females, the males build, decorate, and maintain elaborate structures—the avian equivalent of bachelor pads—called bowers. These things are constructed with gathered twigs and objects like brightly colored stones, fresh flowers, or iridescent insect skeletons that are specially placed for the most impressive display. Find out more!

All bowerbirds are frugivores, living mainly on the fruits of trees and bushes; occasionally, they eat insects, spiders, and seeds. Since tree fruits are abundant most of the year, and it is a high energy food source, a fruit diet gives the male plenty of time to build his bower.

Male bowerbirds are famous for creating complicated bowers that are used for display during the mating ritual. These bowers can take many forms, with each type of bower particular to the species but also special to the individual male and his available resources.

A male may spend a week to two months getting his bower in order, depending on whether he is refurbishing a previously used structure or building a new one.

Once the bower is complete, the male adds decorative touches using everything and anything he can find and carry: seeds, pebbles, snail shells, berries, ferns, lichens, dead beetles, fresh flowers, spider webbing, bones, leaves, even bits of glass, cloth, plastic, aluminum foil, and other items discarded by humans.

After the male dances, sings, and grovels along the ground, seemingly begging a female to accept him, they mate, and the female usually leaves. If she lingers, the male may drive her out so he can tidy up his bower and prepare for the next song-and-dance routine used to attract yet another mate.