logoalt Hacker News

mc32today at 3:00 AM1 replyview on HN

A gray jay sounds about right.

I get that the changing weather might change their habitual latitudes but there was and is always some "boundary" between the two, no? So there was always a boundary but it moves north or south depending on warming or cooling climates (these birds have been around for millions of years). How did they only mate now?


Replies

Suppaflytoday at 4:51 AM

> How did they only mate now?

A lot of the differences between species is due to behavior issues, not actual physical difficulty. It's likely that both species of jay mate at different times or display different mating signals. They've been separated for something like 75 million years which leaves plenty of time for their behaviors to change.