Blue-throated Barbet

The magical blue-throated barbet is an Asian barbet having bright green, blue & red plumage, seen across the India, Northeast Pakistan, Bhutan, Nepal, Bangladesh, Southwest China, Thailand, central Laos, north Annam and Vietnam. Blue-throated barbet is a small green bird with a blue head and throat. It has a red crown and lores, bordered in black, in between the black and red lores, there is a thin tan line. Its tail is green while its beak his ivory (horn-coloured) and the upper mandible are tipped in blackish grey. Its under-tail coverts are a bluish-grey. Its eyes are brown. The blue-throated barbet “Psilopogon asiaticus” and toucans are a group of near passerine birds with a worldwide tropical distribution.

The species get their name from the bristles which fringe their heavy bills. The bird size is 22–23 cm; 61–103 g like to eats figs, flowers, berries and insects such as grubs, crickets, mantises, ants, cicadas, dragonflies, locusts, beetles and moths.. They are widespread residents in the hills of Himalayas. These blue-throated barbet species are non-migratory resident birds. The birds in higher altitudes may descent to lower levels during winter. They frequent evergreen forests, deciduous forests, gardens, orchards, teak forests and cities with fruiting trees. The turquoise-throated barbet was formerly considered a subspecies. Males and females look alike. Young birds have an overall duller plumage.  The species breeding season normally starts in March and goes on until July.

The bird’s courtship behavior consists of mutual feeding, and paired birds will ‘duet’ and display. Both parents habitually excavate a nest hole about 1.5 m to more than 8 m above the ground, every so often on the underside of a dead branch. They line their nest with grasses, wool or plant materials.  It is alike to other members of Psilopogon, closely related to Moustached Barbet and also related to Golden-throated Barbet, P. franklinii and Black-browed Barbet, P. oorti. The average clutch consists of 2 to 5 white, oval, slightly glossed and thin-shelled eggs, which are incubated by both parents for about 14 days. Both parents also share in raising the chicks once they have hatched. The young are believed to fledge when they are about 30 to 40 days old. The population size has not been quantified, but it is not believed to approach the thresholds for Vulnerable under the population size criterion.

Banded Broadbill,

The banded broadbill “Eurylaimus javanicus”It is found in Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam. The bird’s natural habitat is subtropical or tropical moist lowland forests. The species is a husky, forest-dwelling bird with a large head and a wide bill is atoned in purplish, black and yellow hues. It has a large purplish-black band across its chest, bluish-grey eyes have various yellow spots on its wings and some yellow on its rump. The birds prefer swamp forest, evergreen and mixed deciduous forest near rivers and streams on plantations, in gardens and parks, and around villages.

The species is a large broadbill average 21.5–23 cm, with purple, yellow and black plumage. The diet consist of eats predominantly insects, including grasshoppers, crickets, katydids, various beetles, caterpillars, larvae also recorded eating figs. The specie naturally builds a large nest suspended from a tree branch. The bird’s voice is typical song a far-carrying, brief, sharp “wheeoo” continuing with a long, ascending trill that may last up to five seconds. The Banded Broadbill is alike to the Black-and-yellow Broadbill, except that it's mostly atoned in black and peach, not purple.

The species is evaluated as least concern, because it has an extremely large range, hence does not approach the thresholds for Vulnerable under the range size criterion.  This species may be rarely targeted for the cagebird trade, some forest loss within its altitudinal range, especially around Carita, and including at the lower edges of protected areas. The bird naturally sits motionlessly in the trees, in small groups or pairs and scan for moving prey. When they spot something, habitually in the foliage, they fly out to grab it

The Masked Crimson Tanager

The masked crimson tanager “Ramphocelus nigrogularis” is a species of bird belong to the family Thraupidae. The stunning masked crimson tanager normally found in Brazil, Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, and Peru. Its natural habitats are subtropical or tropical swamps and subtropical or tropical moist shrubland. The masked crimson tanager is found across Amazonia and is abundant. It prefers to dwell near bodies of water such as lakes, swamps or rivers, generally at altitudes below 2000 ft. The masked crimson tanager makes a high-pitched single note variously transcribed "tink", and a simple melody often sung at dawn. Masked crimson tanagers may also feed on the nectar of flowers as part of their diet. They feed on flowers of Erythrina fusca plants without damaging them, while simultaneously contacting the anthers of the flowers with their heads, thus making them effective pollinators.

Moreover, the bird name is derived from the Latin words niger "black", and gularis "throated". It is one of nine species of brightly colored tanagers of the genus Ramphocelus. The species measuring 18 to 19 cm in length, while the adult male has a black face, wings, mantle, belly and tail, and is a bright red elsewhere in its plumage, while the bill has a silver sheen. Though the female resembles with male but has a brownish belly and duller plumage overall, while the juvenile is duller still, and resembles the vermilion tanager but the latter lives at higher altitudes. The birds prefer to move in troops of 10 to 12 birds, can form mixed species flocks with the silver-beaked tanager and it is frugivorous (fruit-eating). 

The masked crimson tanager has been speculated to engage in reverse sexual dominance behavior alike to their congener pair, the silver-beaked tanager. The birds belong to the passerine bird order; exhibit this behavior same to that of their cousin. Though, there is no observable evidence to backing the hypothesis that the masked crimson tanager are among the rare and unexplained phenomenon of reverse sexual dominance. Therefore, under normal situations, passerine species of birds demonstrate a default hierarchy of dominance wherein larger, heavier birds tend to dominate the smaller, lighter birds and males incline to dominate females. The masked crimson tanagers select to inhabit sites close to or around oxbow lakes, a common geographical feature of their native Amazon biome.

They demonstrate aggression while defending the more productive areas around the lakes, causing the silver-beaked tanager to occupy the riparian forest. The species are competitively superior and dominate most interspecies interactions with their cousin. The species breeds in between the dry and wet seasons of the seasonal tropics that they occupy. This species of tanager contributes in cooperative breeding, which includes the communal care and protection of the offspring. In neotropical forests, the masked crimson tanager congregates in mixed flocks much like those seen in flycatchers and vireos. The degree to which the masked crimson tanager forms mixed flocks correlates with the relative extent to which broad-leafed canopy make up the composition of the neotropical forest.

Like most tanagers, masked crimson tanagers are mostly frugivorous, supplementing their fruit diets with small insects such as flying termites. Their insectivorous tendency is driven by the periodic cycle of the breeding of termites, which yield winged males and females when sexually active. These termites are richer in nutrients than normal wood termites and therefore it may become more ecologically sound for the masked crimson tanager to feed on these insects to supplement their existing diets. This species has an extremely large range, and hence does not approach the thresholds for Vulnerable under the range size criterion. Despite the fact that the population trend appears to be decreasing, the decline is not believed to be sufficiently rapid to approach the thresholds for Vulnerable under the population trend, hence species is evaluated as Least Concern.

Yellow Cardinal

Jeremy Black, an Alabama wedding and wildlife photographer, spent almost five hours in a friend’s back yard in the optimism of capturing an image of what he called “the most captivating cardinal in Alabaster, Alabama.” The northern cardinal that Black ended up photographing was not the usual deep red of males but dazzlingly yellow. It could easily claim to be the most captivating bird in the nation. The yellow cardinal “Gubernatrix cristata” is a species of bird in the family Thraupidae. It is the only member of its genus, Gubernatrix. The term "yellow cardinal" or "yellow morph" may also describe a northern cardinal which is yellow because it lacks the usual enzyme which converts yellow pigments in food to the red pigments in the feathers of most of its species. Sightings are rare.

Black’s photo, which was shared on the Facebook page of the Naturalist’s Notebook, promptly went viral.  As soon as it landed, I was star-struck, took my breath away a little bit. Initially I thought it was a species of yellow bird she had never seen before. Then he realized that the creature, with its black mask and crested head, looked just like a cardinal just one of a different color. This coloration is not unique, but it is aberrant, according to a 2003 research paper on what at the time was said to be the first-ever reported yellow northern cardinal in the United States. Researchers who studied its feathers concluded that the bird had a genetic mutation that impaired the metabolic processes that normally make red feathers out of the carotenoid-rich yellow and orange foods in a male cardinal’s diet.

It’s a one in a million mutation, had never seen a live yellow cardinal in 40 years of birdwatching. Rare though they are, yellow northern cardinals seem a bit more common with the advent of digital cameras and social media. A pair was spotted in Kentucky in 2011. It is estimated that in any given year there are two or three yellow cardinals at backyard feeding stations somewhere in the U.S. or Canada. There are probably a million bird feeding stations in that area so very roughly; yellow cardinals are a one in a million mutation.

The Distinctive Pin-Tailed Manakin

The stunning and highly distinctive pin-tailed manakin (Ilicura militaris) is a species of bird in the family Pipridae. It is the only member of the monotypic genus Ilicura. It is endemic to eastern Brazil, where its natural habitats are subtropical or tropical moist lowland forest and subtropical or tropical moist montane forest. The Pin-tailed Manakin is not rare but it is nonetheless highly prized by birdwatchers, particularly as its strangely quiet vocalizations can render it unobtrusive, making encounters much less frequent than with other manakins that occur in the same region. Moreover, Male manakins are well-known for their elaborate group courtship displays, which habitually take place on gathering grounds called "leks." Thus, Female manakins visit these leks to pick a mate from the group of displaying males. The male Pin-tailed Manakins "dance" alone, making whirring and snapping sounds with particular wing and tail feathers and flashing their bright red rump feathers during short, rapid flights.

Males have flashy plumage, while females are a dull greenish color. These small, short-tailed birds tend to be solitary but can occur within mixed-species flocks. The male Pin-tailed Manakin is one of prettiest of manakins, and even the female is hard to confuse given that it shares the male’s “unusual” head shape and ‘pin-tail’ central rectrices. The pin tailed manakin prefers humid forest, woodlots and mature second growth, perhaps most often in valleys. The species systematic relationships have only recently been elucidated, although its uniqueness has long been recognized by taxonomists. Though, some facets of the Pin-tailed Manakin’s life history, in particular its breeding biology and diet, are still relatively inadequately known. This species has a very large range, and hence does not approach the thresholds for Vulnerable under the range size criterion hence species is evaluated as Least Concern.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Golden Plover: A Bird Can Fly 4800 km Non-Stop in 3 to 4 days

The Pacific golden plover (Pluvialis fulva) is a medium-sized plover, and it is believed that golden plovers flocked when rain was imminent.  The Pacific golden plover is 23 to 26 cm long breeding adult is spotted gold and black on the crown, and back on the wings. The bird face and neck are black with a white border, and it has a black breast and a dark rump. The legs are black. In winter, the black is lost and the plover then has a yellowish face and breast, and white underparts. It is alike to two other golden plovers, “The Eurasian” and “American plovers”. The Pacific golden plover is smaller, slimmer and relatively longer-legged than the European golden plover, also has white axillary feathers.

Generally, the Pacific golden plover is found to be more comparable to the American golden plover, with which it was once considered conspecific as "lesser golden plover". The Pacific golden plover is slimmer than the American species, has a shorter primary projection, longer legs, and is habitually found to have more yellow on the back. This wader forages for food on tundra, fields, beaches and tidal flats, frequently by sight. The birds like to eats insects and crustaceans and some berries. The breeding habitat of Pacific golden plover is the Arctic tundra from northernmost Asia into western Alaska. It nests on the ground in a dry open area. It is migratory and winters in south Asia and Australasia.

A few winters in California and Hawaii, USA. In Hawaii, the bird is recognized as the kōlea. It is very rare vagrant to Western Europe. They return to the same wintering territory each year, which allowed scientists in Hawaii to attach tiny light level geolocation devices to the birds and then retrieve them the following year in the same location. Moreover, a study revealed that these birds make the 4800 km non-stop flight between Alaska and Hawaii in 3 to 4 days. In winter they form large flocks which fly in fairly tight formation with fast, twinkling wingbeats. Plover is a large shorebird of pastures, open ground, and mudflats, makes one of the longest migratory journeys of any shorebird. It breeds on the high Arctic tundra of Alaska and Canada and winters in the grasslands of central and southern South America.

However, the American Golden-Plover “Pluvialis dominica” has a long, circular migration route. In the fall it flies offshore from the East Coast of North America nonstop to South America. On the return in the spring it passes primarily through the middle of North America to reach its Arctic breeding grounds. Adult American Golden-Plovers leave their Arctic breeding grounds in early summer, but juveniles usually linger until late summer or fall. Some adults arrive on the wintering grounds in southern South America before the last juveniles have left the Arctic. The oldest American Golden-Plover was at least 13 years old, when it was recaptured and rereleased during a banding operation in Alaska. The bird feeds in short vegetation or open areas and moves by stop-run-stop, scanning and capturing prey at stops. Captures prey by single peck or series of pecks.

The “Hoopoe” is Distinctive Crown Feathers Bird

The hoopoe is a medium sized colorful bird, almost 25 to 32 cm long, with a 44 to 48 cm wingspan. The bird weighs is approximately 46 to 89 g. The species is highly distinctive, notable for its distinctive “crown” of feathers with a long, thin tapering bill that is black with a fawn base. The strengthened musculature of the head allows the bill to be opened when probing inside the soil. The bird has wide and rounded wings gifted of strong flight; these’re larger in the northern migratory subspecies. The bird has a characteristic undulating flight, which is same that of a giant butterfly, caused by the wings half closing at the end of each beat or short sequence of beats.

The hoopoe or Upupa epops is the only extant species in the family Upupidae. Well, same as Latin name upupa, the English name is an onomatopoeic form which reproduces the cry of the bird. The hoopoe is the national bird of Republic of Israel. The bird is named after its vocalizations, the Eurasian hoopoe emits a low “hoop, hoop, hoop, hoop”. The pinkish brown to chestnut plumage with black and white bars and an inspiring fan-like crest make the Eurasian hoopoe instantly recognizable. The Eurasian hoopoe forages mainly on short grass and bare soil for invertebrates.

The Savanna Hawk

The savanna hawk is a hefty raptor found in open savanna and swamp edges. It was formerly placed in the genus Heterospizias.  The Savanna Hawk is widespread raptor and their habitats throughout the lowlands of tropical and subtropical South America. The savanna hawk has very long legs and thus is able to easily walk on the ground to catch its prey, or, like other birds, it can swoop down from the sky or a tree.

The savanna hawk length is 46 to 61 cm and weighs 845 g. The adult hawk has a rufous body with grey mottling above and fine black barring below. The flight feathers of the long broad wings are black, and the tail is banded black and white. Savanna hawk legs are yellow color and call is a loud scream keeeeru. Savanna hawk nest consist of sticks lined with grass and built in a palm tree. Though, the clutch is a single white egg, and the young take 6.5 to 7.5 weeks to fledging. Savanna Hawks can often be found walking through burning fields, a few feet behind the flames, searching for toasted prey.

Immature birds are similar to the adults but have darker, duller upperparts, paler underparts with coarser barring, and a whitish supercilium. This species perches very vertically, and its legs are strikingly long. Savanna Hawk normally breeds from Panama and Trinidad south to Bolivia, Uruguay and central Argentina. Its foraging strategy is equally diverse, and it will capture prey on the wing, from perches, or even by stalking on foot. It is also the most distinctive member of Buteogallus, with considerable gray patterning overlaying a rufous body.

Savanna hawks build their nests out of sticks in palm trees, thorny trees or mangroves and use this same nest year after year. Its eggs however are sometimes eaten by larger birds, snakes and other animals that live in trees. The savanna hawk scientific name is “Buteogallus meridionalis” feeds on small mammals, lizards, snakes, crabs and large insects. It usually sits on an open high perch from which it swoops on its prey, but will also hunt on foot, and several birds may gather at grass fires. The population size is very large, and hence does not approach the thresholds for Vulnerable under the population size criterion, hence the species is evaluated as Least Concern.

Galapagos Big Birds Can Develop in as Little as Two Generations

As we all know, nature is the storehouse of wonders, and numerous events are happening around us which are astonishingly implausible. Till now, modern science thought that evolution is a process which happens in a long course of time. However, newly, scientists discovered a new species of finches in Galapagos Island which evolved into a completely new species within a very short period of time. Researchers revealed that new species can develop in as little as two generations and the findings would have left Charles Darwin excited. The arrival of 36 years ago of a peculiar bird to a remote island in the Galapagos provides direct genetic evidence of their claims.

The newcomer, who belonged to one species, mated with a member of another species on the small island of Daphne Major in the Pacific Ocean. Therefore this produced a new species, recognized as the “Big Birds” that now involves of approximately 30 birds, according to researchers from Princeton University and Uppsala University in Finland. The researchers took a blood sample and released the bird, which later bred with a resident medium ground finch of the species Geospiz fortis, starting a new lineage. The Grants and their research team followed the new “Big Bird lineage” for six generations, taking blood samples for use in genetic analysis.

The new study, published in the journal Science, followed work carried out over the last four decades on Darwin’s finches in the Galapagos Islands. Through our work on Daphne Major, we were able to observe the pairing up of two birds from different species and then follow what happened to see how speciation occurred, Rosemary Grant, senior biologist at Princeton in the US, said:  The newcomer, a male with an rare song which was larger in size than the three resident species on the island, was spotted in 1981. He was so different from the other birds that we knew he did not hatch from an egg on Daphne Major.” It is very remarkable that when we match the size and shape of the Big Bird beaks with the beak morphologies of the other three species inhabiting Daphne Major, the Big Birds occupy their own niche in the beak morphology space.

The current study, DNA collected from the parent birds and their offspring over the years. They learned that the original male parent was a large cactus finch of the species Geospiza conirostris from Española Island, more than 100km away. The distance meant the male finch could not return home to mate with a member of his own species, so chose a mate from among the three species on Daphne Major. Thus, this reproductive isolation is considered a critical step in the development of a new species when two separate species interbreed. It is believed that the amount of time these birds spent on birdfeeders has resulted in this evolution and its infrequent growth from the 1970s and is still continuing today.

The offspring were also reproductively isolated as their song, used to attract mates, was unusual and failed to attract females from the resident species. They also differed from the resident species in beak size and shape, which is a major cue for mate choice. This led the offspring to mate with members of their own lineage, strengthening the development of the new species. Researchers previously thought the formation of a new species takes a very long time. But in the Big Bird lineage, it happened in just two generations, according to observations made in the field, along with the genetic studies. The researchers say a striking aspect is that after just two generations, the new lineage behaved as any other species of Darwin’s finches would. Leif Andersson, a professor at Uppsala University in Sweden, said: “A naturalist who came to Daphne Major without knowing that this lineage arose very recently would have recognised this lineage as one of the four species on the island.

This clearly demonstrates the value of long-running field studies. We’ve no indication about the long-term survival of the Big Bird lineage, but it has the huge potential to become a success, and it offers a stunning example of one way in which speciation occurs. The scientists said it is probable that new lineages like the Big Birds have originated numerous times during the evolution of Darwin’s finches. The majority of these lineages have gone extinct but some may have led to the evolution of contemporary species, they concluded.Source: Charismatic Planet

Dusky Lory Parrot

An eye-catching parrot “The dusky lory” (Pseudeos fuscata) is a species of parrot in the family Psittaculidae. Alternative common names are the white-rumped lory or the dusky-orange lory. This beautiful parrot is short tailed just 25cm long, and has mainly brown and whitish back and rumps. Mostly it is found in New Guinea and the offshore islands of Batanta, Yapen and Salawati. The dusky lory's native range includes New Guinea below about 2500m in both the Indonesian zones of the island. It is also native to the nearby Indonesian islands of Salawati and Yapen.

The Dusky Lory has two color phases; the band across the upper chest together with its abdomen is either yellow or orange. However, the beak is dark orange, and an area of bare orange skin at the base of its lower mandible. The irises are red and the legs are grey. As far as external appearance the both male and females are identical. Though, the juveniles are duller with a yellowish back and rump, yellowish-grey irises, and a beak that is yellow at the base and brown/black towards the tip. The Dusky Lory natural habitats are subtropical or tropical moist lowland forests, subtropical or tropical mangrove forests, and subtropical or tropical moist montane forests. Dusky Lory calls heard as harsh and grating screeches. They reach reproductive maturity when they are about 2 to 2.5 years old. Lories are typically quite easily bred; so many Lory species are readily available. The average clutch consists of 2 - 3 eggs, which are incubated for 24 - 25 days. The young fledge when they are about 10 weeks old.

The parrot wild Diet consists of flowers, fruits, seeds, nuts and insects. Lories require a higher percentage of fruit, buds, nectar and pollen in their diet. In fact, in the wild, they can feed on as many as 640 flowers in a one day. They also feed on seeds and unripe grain. Their ecology and behavior is very social, forming large, boisterous flocks. He mainly relies on availability of flowering trees for food and is therefore nomadic, and roosts communally in large groups. However, this stunning species is considered endangered within their natural range, typically due to habitat destruction; there is a high demand for these birds as pets or aviary birds, and they have been doing well in captivity and are, therefore, regionally readily available on the pet market. Maybe the most playful of the lories, excellent pets and great talkers. The only drawback is their terrible, high pitched screeching! They would never work in an apartment. It can live 28 to 32 years, and one of the major contributors of ill health and early death in pet birds is the fact that their specific dietary needs are neglected.