Striated caracara

 Name: Striated Carcara, Johnny Rook, Caracara Austral, Matamico Estriado, Matamico Grande, Tiuque Cordillerano Austral. (Phalcoboenus australis)

Length: 60 cm.

Weight: 1.2 kg

Location: Falklands, Tierra del Fuego.

Conservation status: Near Threatened.

Diet: Carrion, offal, food scraps, insects, worms, lambs, small seabirds, eggs and young of larger seabirds.

Appearance: Eagle-like, dark brown plumage, grey-yellow legs and talons. White tips around neck, back of head, and tips of tail feathers. Yellow patches around bottom of eye and rear of beak. Hooked grey bill.

How do Striated Caracaras feed?

Striated Caracaras are opportunistic – they’ll feed on almost anything they can. They’ll eat the young and eggs of seabirds, and hunt smaller seabirds in their burrows or on the wing.

They will investigate human refuse for food and will eat offal. They will scavenge carcasses.

They’re also known for overturning rocks for food which is a sign of higher intelligence in birds – it’s a form of adaptation and problem-solving.

Are Striated Caracaras social?

Striated Caracaras may hunt together in flocks numbering up to 50 individuals.

How fast do Striated Caracaras move?

Striated Caracaras are fast fliers and can reach speeds in excess of 60 km per hour.

What are Striated Caracara birthing rituals like?

Striated Caracaras build their nests on the ground or on cliff edges. The nests are built of twigs and vegetation, which is thin lined with wool or grass. The breeding season occurs from December through the end of February. The female lays up to four eggs. Incubation takes about a month.

The births are timed to coincide with the birthing season of prey seabirds. This gives the parents easy access to food for their young, and for the young themselves once they leave the nest.

The juveniles’ coverage is brown at first and will take up to 5 years to reach its adult colouring.

How long do Striated Caracaras live?

It’s not known how long Striated Caracaras live in the wild but those raised in captivity can live more than 30 years.

How many Striated Caracaras are there today?

There are approximately 500 breeding pairs of Striated Caracaras found in the Falklands. Overall there may be up to 2500 mature individuals, or up to 4,000 individuals in total.

Do Striated Caracaras have any natural predators?

Striated Caracaras do not have any significant natural predators. The biggest threat they have faced is from sheep farmers who began an intensive effort to exterminate them from the Falklands in 1908. Thankfully this decision was reversed in the 1920s, though the population has still not fully recovered to its former levels.7 Superb Striated Caracara Facts

They are known to steal red objects like hats of gloves. This might be because the red colouring makes them think the object is meat.

Striated Caracaras were once intensively hunted in the Falklands because they were such a menace to the local sheep farmers. However they are now protected by law and cannot be killed without permission from the Falklands government.

Striated Caracaras have the southernmost distribution of birds of prey in the world.

Striated Caracaras are quite curious and show little fear of humans. Charles Darwin first found that he could catch them with just a hand-net. This curiosity might actually serve an evolutionary trait – it helps them discover new ways to find sources of food.

Striated Caracaras are the largest of the genus Phalcoboenus.

Striated Caracaras are only found on islands where there are also populations of seals or seabirds.

Striated Caracaras are one of the world’s rarest forms of raptor.

Oriental Dwarf Kingfisher

 The oriental dwarf kingfisher (Ceyx erithaca), also known as the black-backed kingfisher, is a tiny bird only slightly bigger than a hummingbird. They live in southeast Asia, where they inhabit evergreen and deciduous forests near streams and ponds. They stay low to the ground, where they perch and wait for prey to come close before darting out and snatching their meal. Learn everything there is to know about the oriental kingfisher, including where they live, what they eat, and how they behave. 

5 Amazing Oriental Dwarf Kingfisher Facts

• They build their nests in underground tunnels that lead to an inclined egg chamber.
• This kingfisher species has three toes!
• Their population is decreasing from ongoing habitat destruction.
• The oriental dwarf is one of the smallest kingfishers.
• They migrate at night in large flocks.

Where to Find the Oriental Dwarf Kingfisher

Oriental dwarf kingfishers live in Asia in 15 countries, such as China, India, Thailand, Singapore, and the Philippines. Most populations are sedentary in their environments, but others in the northernmost region of their range migrate south for the winter. They inhabit forest and wetland habitats but are most commonly found in evergreen and deciduous forests. They like to live near forest streams and ponds with plenty of canopy shade. However, they keep their nests far away from water. Look for them low to the ground, where they perch and fly out to catch prey.

Oriental Dwarf Kingfisher Nest

They build their nests in stream banks or soil near the roots of a fallen tree. Both sexes dig a tunnel leading to an unlined egg chamber, which they build at an incline to help with drainage from water and waste.

Scientific Name

The oriental dwarf kingfisher (Ceyx erithaca) belongs to the Coraciiformes order in the Alcedinidae family, which encompasses the kingfishers primarily found in Africa and Asia. The Ceyx genus includes the river kingfishers from southeast Asia. There are three recognized subspecies of oriental dwarf kingfisher: C. e. Erithaca, C. e. Macrocarus, and C. e. motleyi.

Size, Appearance, & Behavior

The oriental kingfisher is a pocket-sized bird and one of the smallest kingfisher species. It measures four to six inches long and weighs 0.4 to 0.7 ounces, with an unknown wingspan. Males and females are similar in size and feature the same coloring: lilac crowns, rumps, and tails, dark blue and black wings, white chins and throats, yellow-orange underparts, red legs, feet, and bills, and black forehead spots. This kingfisher species has three toes and is sometimes referred to as the “three-toed kingfisher.”

This bird is mainly solitary, preferring to forage and perch alone. However, they form monogamous pairs during breeding, and some may join large flocks during migration. Their vocalizations include loud, high-pitched shrills and softer calls when in flight. And these little birds are swift and agile when hunting prey, but their exact speed is unknown. 

Migration Pattern and Timing

These kingfishers are residents throughout most of their range. But the northernmost populations in Bangladesh and Myanmar will migrate south for the winter in Malaysia. They travel at night in large flocks from August to December.

Diet

The oriental dwarf kingfisher is a carnivore who forages alone on a low perch.

What Does the Oriental Dwarf Kingfisher Eat?

Their diet consists of mantises, grasshoppers, mayflies, winged ants, water beetles, and flies. They also eat spiders, worms, crabs, lizards, frogs, and small fish. This bird is a solitary hunter that forages from a post in low vegetation, flying out to capture its prey. They may also catch insects midflight, snatch spiders from their web, and pluck fish just below the water’s surface. They take larger creatures back to their perch, striking them with their beaks before consuming them.

Predators, Threats, and Conservation Status

The IUCN lists the oriental dwarf kingfisher as LC or “least concern.” Due to its extensive range, this species does not meet the “threatened” status thresholds. Their population is decreasing but not rapidly enough to meet vulnerable levels. Clearing of their forest habitat is their biggest threat, and their decrease is likely to continue from human activity. Their other hazards include pollution, hunting, electrocution from power lines, collision, exhaustion, and starvation.

Lady Amherst’s pheasant

Lady Amherst’s pheasant (Chrysolophus amherstiae) is a bird of the order Galliformes and the family Phasianidae. The genus name is from Ancient Greek khrusolophos, “with golden crest”. The English name and amherstiae commemorates Sarah Amherst, who was responsible for sending the first specimen of the bird to London in 1828. Lady Amherst’s pheasant is evaluated as Least Concern on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species.

Distribution and habitat

The species is native to southwestern China and far northern Myanmar, but has been introduced elsewhere. Previously, a self-supporting feral population was established in England, the stronghold of which was in West Bedfordshire. Lady Amherst first introduced the ornamental pheasant on her estates, near the Duke of Bedford’s Woburn Abbey, where the birds were also shot for game and interbred. Although the introduced British populations are believed to have been extinct since 2015, occasional sightings of the species have occurred in subsequent years; a Lady Amherst’s pheasant was photographed in Staplegrove, Taunton in May 2020, and subsequently, in early March 2021, a Lady Amherst’s pheasant was spotted in a garden in Scotland.

Description

The adult male is 100–120 cm (40-48 in.) in length, its tail accounting for 80 cm (31 in) of the total length. It is unmistakable with its nuchal cape white black, with a red crest. The long grey tail and rump is red, blue, dark green, white and yellow plumage. The “cape” can be raised in display. This species is closely related to the golden pheasant (C. pictus), but has a yellow eye, blue-green bare skin around it. The bill is horn-coloured and they had blue-gray legs.

The female is much less showy, with a duller mottled brown plumage all over, similar to that of the female common pheasant (P. colchicus) but with finer barring. She is very like the female golden pheasant, but has a darker head and cleaner underparts than the hen of that species.

Despite the male’s showy appearance, these birds are very difficult to see in their natural habitat, which is dense, dark forests with thick undergrowth. Consequently, little is known of their behavior in the wild.

Diet and behavior

They feed on the ground on grain, leaves and invertebrates, but roost in trees at night. Whilst they can fly, they prefer to run, but if startled they can suddenly burst upwards at great speed, with a distinctive wing sound. The male emits a metallic call in the breeding season.

I know Why The Caged Bird Sings

The free bird leaps

on the back of the wind

and floats downstream

till the current ends

and dips his wings

in the orange sun rays

and dares to claim the sky.

But a bird that stalks

down his narrow cage

can seldom see through

his bars of rage

his wings are clipped and

his feet are tied

so he opens his throat to sing.

The caged bird sings

with fearful trill

of the things unknown

but longed for still

and his tune is heard

on the distant hill

for the caged bird

sings of freedom

The free bird thinks of breeze

an the trade winds soft through the sighing trees

and the fat worms waiting on a dawn bright lawn

and he names the sky his own.

But a caged bird stand on the grave of dreams

his shadow shouts on a nightmare scream

his wings are clipped and his feet are tied

so he opens his throat to sing

The caged bird sings

with a fearful trill

of things unknown

but longed for still

and his tune is heard

n the distant hill

for the caged bird

sings of freedom

I was born to fly free

I was never meant 

to be kept in a 

cage or anything

that resembles one.

I was never meant 

to be trapped or

enslaved by anything.

including my fears

or my addictions.

I am not just meant 

to fly…I am

meant to soar.

I must remember to 

never let anything 

enslave me. My life

is too important.

I am brave girl

I was born to fly free.

I never truly lived

So many people walk this earth,

With purpose in their eyes,

But in their heart of hearts they know,

What they’re living is a lie,

The alarm goes off at 6am,

Like every other day,

So they can walk into a job they hate,

Because they need the pay,

All time does is take from them,

But it never seems to give,

Always waiting for the day to come,

When they finally start to live,

I’m all too scared that one day soon,

I’ll become just like the rest,

Only walking with crowd,

Because my dreams have been oppressed,

That one day I’ll look back on life,

At the opportunities that I missed,

And realize I never truly lived,

All I did was just exist.

Blood pheasant

The Blood Pheasant has kind of a disturbing name, but it gets it from the red skin of its face and legs, and the red feathers on the chin, chest, and tail. They are small members of their family, and are the only species found within the genus Ithaginis, though there are a dozen recognized subspecies.

Blood Pheasants are found in the countries surrounding the Himalayas– China, India, Nepal, and Bhutan. They prefer to live in coniferous forests, and range at elevations of 10,000-15,000 feet during the breeding season, and slightly lower during the rest of the year.

These birds are not the best fliers, and they get around mostly by running on the ground. They even build their nests on the ground, constructing them under rocks and inside shrubs. These ground nests can be problematic, however, as sometimes the eggs must be moved or abandoned altogether if the parents feel there is too much risk. Broods can number over a dozen in size, and the young chicks are able to get up and follow mom around when they are only two days old. They will remain as a group until winter.

The species is very rarely found in captivity, and at present it does not appear that there are any in United States institutions. Blood Pheasants live in very remote regions in the wild, and so have been safe from many of the threats that endanger different pheasant species. However, the population does appear to be on the decline, though it is slow enough to list them as being of Least Concern.

Common name:

blood pheasant (en); faisão-sangue(pt); ithagine ensanglantée (fr); faisán de sangre (es); blutfasan (de)

Taxonomy:

Order Galliformes

Family Phasianidae

Range:

This Asian species is found in the mountains of Nepal, northern India, Bhutan, Tibet, northern Myanmar and south-central China.

Size:

Blood pheasants are 40-48 cm long and weigh 410-620 g.

Habitat:

These birds are found in coniferous and mixed forests, in bamboo forests, scrublands and alpine meadows. They occur at altitudes of 2.500-4.500 m.

Diet:

These birds eat lichens, pine seeds, green shoots, berries and some invertebrates including snails, butterflies, flies and beetles.

Breeding:

Blood pheasants breed in May-July. They nest on the ground, in a shallow saucer made of dry twigs lined with leaves, thin tree roots and mosses. The female lays 5-14 pink or yellowish white eggs with brown speckles, which she incubates alone for 27-33 days while the male stands guard. The chicks are able to walk and feed themselves just 2 days after hatching, but continue to be brooded and protected by the female for 5-6 weeks.

Conservation:

IUCN status – LC (Least concern)

This species has a very large breeding range and is reported to be common and widespread in some areas and scarce in others. Populations are declining throughout much of its range owing to habitat loss and degradation caused by timber extraction, overgrazing and agricultural conversion, as well as hunting pressure. Still, the blood pheasant is not considered threatened at present.

Snowcap

 The striking Snowcap, like the Honduran Emerald and Mangrove Hummingbird, is found only in Central America. It is uncommon across its range, but when seen, it is unforgettable. The male’s plumage is a unique mix of iridescent bronzes, purples, and dark reds, contrasting with a shining white cap that stands out like a beacon in the shade of the humid forests where this species occurs. Typical of many hummingbirds, the female Snowcap has more subdued plumage — green above and white beneath, without the flashy white cap.

Additional features make this Central American specialty a sought-after sighting.

Small Wonder

At 2.5 inches long, the Snowcap is one of the of the world’s smallest hummingbirds — only a quarter of an inch longer than the tiny Bee Hummingbird of Cuba, generally considered to be the world’s most diminutive bird. Also, the Snowcap weighs less than a penny. In fact, it is so small that it’s often mistaken for a bumblebee, moth, or other large insect.

Altitude Adjustments

The Snowcap is resident in Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and western Panama. It breeds in humid forests on Caribbean-facing mountain slopes, at elevations of 1,000 to 2,600 feet. After the breeding season, most descend to adjacent lowlands, a phenomenon called altitudinal migration that is seen in other birds ranging from the Resplendent Quetzal to the Rainbow-bearded Thornbill.

Although widely distributed, the Snowcap is often difficult to find, and its numbers are suspected to be declining.

Male Snowcaps sing on group display grounds, known as leks. Their song is a squeaky chatter: tsitsup tsitsup tsitsup tsuu ttsee.

Petite Pollinator

The Snowcap sips nectar at small flowers on trees, vines, shrubs, and epiphytes, ranging from high in the tree canopy down to eye level. Like other hummingbirds, it also takes tiny insects. Male Snowcaps establish feeding territories and aggressively defend them against other males and also large insects that try to feed there. Although Snowcaps will visit feeders, they are often chased away by larger, more aggressive hummingbird species.

Many native plants rely on hummingbirds like the Snowcap for pollination. The tubular flowers favored by hummingbirds exclude most bees and butterflies and, as a result, prevent pollination by any visitors except for these long-billed birds.

From Lek to Nest

During the breeding season, male Snowcaps join small leks, usually at forest edges, to sing and display to visiting females. A male’s white cap is thought to serve as a signal of his breeding fitness, as is the case with the iridescent crowns of other species such as Costa’s or Anna’s Hummingbirds.

Once a female Snowcap mates, she leaves the lek to build a nest and raise her young alone. First, she chooses a protected spot low in a shrub or tree; then she weaves her cup-shaped nest of plant fibers and mosses, lining it with soft hair and down. She reinforces her nest with elastic material such as spider webs, which allow the nest to stretch to accommodate quickly growing chicks. The female Snowcap lays two eggs, on average, and incubates them for around two weeks. She feeds her young regurgitated nectar and insects, the latter providing protein for quick growth. Young Snowcaps grow rapidly and leave the nest after only two to three weeks.

Tiny Bird Faces Big Threat

The chief threat to the Snowcap is habitat loss from deforestation. Although locally common in some places, this tiny hummingbird is thought to be declining across its range.

ABC has supported the Tirimbina Biological Reserve in Costa Rica, which protects Snowcap habitat. That reserve is a partner in our Latin American Bird Reserve Network. In 2009, ABC supported the purchase of easements totaling nearly 11,000 acres to expand Braulio Carrillo National Park in Costa Rica, which also provides habitat for this lovely hummingbird.

Great Tit Bird

 Green and yellow with a striking glossy black head with white cheeks and a distinctive two-syllable song. It is a woodland bird which has readily adapted to man-made habitats to become a familiar garden visitor. It can be quite aggressive at a birdtable, fighting off smaller tits. In winter it joins with blue tits and others to form roaming flocks which scour gardens and countryside for food.

The Great Tit (Parus major) is a passerine bird in the tit family Paridae. It is a widespread and common species throughout Europe in any sort of woodland. It is resident, and most Great Tits do not migrate. In the past this species was considered a ring species with several subspecies covering a wide distribution, but these have now been separated.

Great Tits come in many races, but they fall into three groups. Great Tits in temperate Europe and Asia are essentially green above and yellow below. Great Tits in China, Korea, Japan and southeastern Russia are green above and white or yellow-tinged white below, and Great Tits in India and south-east Asia are grey above and whitish below.

The Great Tit is easy to recognize, large in size at 14 cm, with a broad black line (broader in the male) down its otherwise yellow front. The neck and head are black with white cheeks and ear coverts. Upper parts are olive. It has a white wingbar and outer tail feathers. In young birds the black is replaced by brown, and the white by yellow.

It is, like other tits, a vocal bird, and has a large variety of calls, of which the most familiar is a “teacher, teacher”, also likened to a squeaky wheelbarrow wheel. 

Great Tits are cavity nesters, breeding in a hole that is usually inside a tree, although occasionally in a wall, rock face, and they will readily take to nest boxes. The number in the clutch is often very large, but seven or eight white spotted red eggs are normal, with bigger clutches being laid by two or even more hens. The bird is a close sitter, hissing when disturbed.

The Great Tit is a popular garden bird due to its acrobatic performances when feeding on nuts or seed. Its willingness to move into nest boxes has made it a valuable study subject in ornithology, and it is one of the best studied birds in the world.

American Goldfinch

Starting in spring and continuing through much of summer, male goldfinches are a bright lemon yellow with black foreheads, black wings and white markings above and beneath their tails. (Females are olive above and dull yellow beneath.) Come winter, both sexes turn a drab brown—so dull they often are mistaken for sparrows. The change occurs through the process of molting. The American goldfinch is the only finch species that molts its body feathers twice a year, once in late winter and again in late summer.

Late Breeders

Frequent molting is both time-consuming and physiologically taxing for the birds. Some scientists suggest this may be the reason goldfinches breed so late in the season—rarely beginning in earnest until mid-July. Another possibility is that the birds wait to nest until thistle, milkweed and other plants have produced fibrous seeds, which goldfinches not only eat but also use to build their nests.

Goldfinches are among the strictest vegetarians in the bird world, selecting an entirely vegetable diet and only inadvertently swallowing an occasional insect. This diet helps protect goldfinches from cowbirds: Though the parasitic birds may lay eggs in goldfinch nests, the hatchlings cannot survive long on an all-seed diet.

Color and Fitness

 Choosy female goldfinches prefer to mate with males that have the brightest plumage. “Color matters”.

Why? One possibility stems from the fact that the male’s color comes from carotenoid pigments (the chemicals that make carrots orange) that he acquires through his diet. By selecting the brightest males, females also may be getting the best food providers for their offspring.