And hummingbirds – although confined to the new world – are like flowers in that in their tiny package is concentrated bursts of color.  These hummingbirds – the rufous hummingbirds, have layers of complex luminous colors.  Their relatives in South America are more dazzling in their flourishes of parrot and orchid.

But again, it's important to note that the reason these animals have such bright colors is because animals have eyes.  Butterflies have complex colors because they need to distinguish themselves from other species in order to reproduce – the more species of butterflies, the more variation in color needs to take place.

And the hummingbirds too, come in such a diverse array of brilliant colors because each species must evolve brighter and richer as females choose ever more brilliant males.  Hummingbirds have wild colors because female hummingbirds have eyes.

But the plants, which need to specialize, need to continue to lure animals to do their work for them, and so they evolve to build ever more complex relationships with the animals upon which they depend. So much of the structure of individual hummingbird and butterfly species is design to interact with certain plant species. A long hummingbird beak, for example, may have been created by a particularly alluring bright red trumpet flower, and through the millenia, these two biological packets of color evolved into ever more brilliant, specialized organisms.

So why do natural colors attract us more than the more perfect, bright and shiny plastic flowers? I am still thinking about this the next day, when I am driving up the Hood River Valley. In the distance, I can see Mount Hood. Below me are rows of cherry, peach and apple orchards, their blooms just beginning to fade.

Those fruits, before they were cultivated for our use, were designed by plants to lure all sorts of creeping and crawling and flying animals to them. And the reason why we like the taste of fruits is because those plants - through the long and random process of evolution - designed tastes that animals like.

Here is the important part - we evolved from those creeping and crawling and flying animals, and so, that is why we still find the greatest pleasure with the most natural flavors.

Taking the advice of a birder friend, I turn off onto an orchard road, then follow a series of roads up the slope of the Hood River valley until I get to mixed pine and oak woodlands. I step out of the car, and walk into the woods.

I call the call of a northern pygmy owl, and within two minutes, standing on a tiny branch only eight feet away from me is a tiny six inch animal that is perfectly camoflaged. His feathers are not brilliant or showy. He is like so many other animals, in that he has evolved to be invisible. Only when he stared directly at me do I see those yellow eyes, impossibly bright.

It is a strange, magical moment, to stand in the woods staring at the eyes of this tiny but ferocious bird of prey.

I have no idea why some owls have bright yellow eyes. But I do know why so much of what we seek and desire in travel comes from biological color. And therein explains why we prefer natural color: we are animals and we have eyes, and we are products of millions of years of evolutionary interplay of color.