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Square-tailed Drongo-cuckoo
The square-tailed drongo-cuckoo (''Surniculus lugubris'') is a species of cuckoo that resembles a black drongo. In the past the species ''S. lugubris'' included the subspecies ''dicruroides'' which is now treated as a separate species the fork-tailed drongo-cuckoo. The species in its restricted sense is found along the Himalayas extending east into Southeast Asia. The calls are series of piercing sharp whistles rising in pitch but shrill and choppily delivered. Description It can be easily distinguished by its downcurved beak and the white barred vent and outer undertail, and the tail only notched with slightly flared tips. In flight a white wing-stripe is visible from below. It is a brood parasite on small babblers. It is not known how or whether the drongo-like appearance benefits this species but it is suspected that it aids in brood-parasitism just as hawk-cuckoos appear like hawks. The square-tailed drongo-cuckoo was formerly considered conspecific with the fork-taile ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Thomas Horsfield
Thomas Horsfield (May 12, 1773 – July 24, 1859) was an American physician and natural history, naturalist who worked extensively in Indonesia, describing numerous species of plants and animals from the region. He was later a curator of the East India Company Museum in London. Early life Horsfield was born in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, and studied medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. He was the grandson of Timothy Horsfield, Sr. (1708-1773), who was born in Liverpool and emigrated to New York in 1725. In New York, his brother Isaac and he ran a butcher shop. The Horsfield family converted from the Church of England to Moravianism, a Protestant denomination with a strong emphasis on education. In 1748, Horsfield, Sr. applied for permission to reside in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. He, however, moved only his family to Bethlehem and joined them the next year. When Northampton County was created in 1752, he was made a justice of peace by Governor Hamilton. In 1763 he was commissio ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cuckoo
Cuckoos are birds in the Cuculidae family, the sole taxon in the order Cuculiformes . The cuckoo family includes the common or European cuckoo, roadrunners, koels, malkohas, couas, coucals and anis. The coucals and anis are sometimes separated as distinct families, the Centropodidae and Crotophagidae respectively. The cuckoo order Cuculiformes is one of three that make up the Otidimorphae, the other two being the turacos and the bustards. The family Cuculidae contains 150 species which are divided into 33 genera. The cuckoos are generally medium-sized slender birds. Most species live in trees, though a sizeable minority are ground-dwelling. The family has a cosmopolitan distribution; the majority of species are tropical. Some species are migratory. The cuckoos feed on insects, insect larvae and a variety of other animals, as well as fruit. Some species are brood parasites, laying their eggs in the nests of other species and giving rise to the metaphor ''cuckoo's egg'', ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Fork-tailed Drongo-cuckoo
The fork-tailed drongo-cuckoo (''Surniculus dicruroides'') is a species of cuckoo that resembles a black drongo. It is found resident mainly in peninsular India in hill forests although some specimens are known from the Himalayan foothills. It can be easily distinguished by its straight beak and the white barred vent. It has a deeply forked tail often having a white spot on the back of the head. The song has been described as a series of 5 or 6 whistling "pip-pip-pip-pip-pip-" notes rising in pitch with each "pip". It is a brood parasite on small Old World babbler, babblers. It is not known how or whether the drongo-like appearance benefits this species but it is suspected that it aids in brood-parasitism just as hawk-cuckoos appear like hawks. The species was described by Brian Hodgson from Nepal as ''Pseudornis dicruroides''. It was later placed as a subspecies of ''Surniculus lugubris''. In 2005 it was suggested that the species was should be split from the more narrowly defi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Southeast Asia
Southeast Asia, also spelled South East Asia and South-East Asia, and also known as Southeastern Asia, South-eastern Asia or SEA, is the geographical United Nations geoscheme for Asia#South-eastern Asia, south-eastern region of Asia, consisting of the regions that are situated south of mainland China, east of the Indian subcontinent, and north-west of mainland Australia. Southeast Asia is bordered to the north by East Asia, to the west by South Asia and the Bay of Bengal, to the east by Oceania and the Pacific Ocean, and to the south by Australia (continent), Australia and the Indian Ocean. Apart from the British Indian Ocean Territory and two out of atolls of Maldives, 26 atolls of Maldives in South Asia, Maritime Southeast Asia is the only other subregion of Asia that lies partly within the Southern Hemisphere. Mainland Southeast Asia is completely in the Northern Hemisphere. East Timor and the southern portion of Indonesia are the only parts that are south of the Equator. Th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Drongo Cuckoo From East Pendam Budang Birding Area In Sikkim, India
The drongos are a family, Dicruridae, of passerine birds of the Old World tropics. The 30 species in the family are placed in a single genus, ''Dicrurus''. Drongos are mostly black or dark grey, short-legged birds, with an upright stance when perched. They have forked tails and some have elaborate tail decorations. They feed on insects and small birds, which they catch in flight or on the ground. Some species are accomplished mimics and have a variety of alarm calls, to which other birds and animals often respond. They are known to utter hoax alarm calls that scare other animals off food, which the drongo then claims. Taxonomy The genus ''Dicrurus'' was introduced by French ornithologist Louis Pierre Vieillot for the drongos in 1816. The type species was subsequently designated as the balicassiao (''Dicrurus balicassius'') by English zoologist George Robert Gray in 1841. The name of the genus combines the Ancient Greek words ''dikros'' "forked" and ''oura'' "tail". "Drongo" ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Brood Parasite
Brood parasites are animals that rely on others to raise their young. The strategy appears among birds, insects and fish. The brood parasite manipulates a host, either of the same or of another species, to raise its young as if it were its own, usually using egg mimicry, with eggs that resemble the host's. The evolutionary strategy relieves the parasitic parents from the investment of rearing young. This benefit comes at the cost of provoking an evolutionary arms race between parasite and host as they coevolve: many hosts have developed strong defenses against brood parasitism, such as recognizing and ejecting parasitic eggs, or abandoning parasitized nests and starting over. It is less obvious why most hosts do care for parasite nestlings, given that for example cuckoo chicks differ markedly from host chicks in size and appearance. One explanation, the mafia hypothesis, proposes that parasitic adults retaliate by destroying host nests where rejection has occurred; there is ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Old World Babbler
The Old World babblers or Timaliidae are a family of mostly Old World passerine birds. They are rather diverse in size and coloration, but are characterised by soft fluffy plumage. These are birds of tropical areas, with the greatest variety in Southeast Asia and the Indian subcontinent. The timaliids are one of two unrelated groups of birds known as babblers, the other being the Australasian babblers of the family Pomatostomidae (also known as pseudo-babblers). Morphological diversity is rather high; most species resemble "warblers", jays or thrushes. This group is among those Old World bird families with the highest number of species still being discovered. Characteristics Timaliids are small to medium birds. They have strong legs, and many are quite terrestrial. They typically have generalised bills, similar to those of a thrush or warbler, except for the scimitar babblers which, as their name implies, have strongly decurved bills. Most have predominantly brown plumage, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Drongo
The drongos are a family, Dicruridae, of passerine birds of the Old World tropics. The 30 species in the family are placed in a single genus, ''Dicrurus''. Drongos are mostly black or dark grey, short-legged birds, with an upright stance when perched. They have forked tails and some have elaborate tail decorations. They feed on insects and small birds, which they catch in flight or on the ground. Some species are accomplished mimics and have a variety of alarm calls, to which other birds and animals often respond. They are known to utter hoax alarm calls that scare other animals off food, which the drongo then claims. Taxonomy The genus ''Dicrurus'' was introduced by French ornithologist Louis Pierre Vieillot for the drongos in 1816. The type species was subsequently designated as the balicassiao (''Dicrurus balicassius'') by English zoologist George Robert Gray in 1841. The name of the genus combines the Ancient Greek words ''dikros'' "forked" and ''oura'' "tail". "Drongo" i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Birds Of South Asia
Birds are a group of warm-blooded vertebrates constituting the class Aves (), characterised by feathers, toothless beaked jaws, the laying of hard-shelled eggs, a high metabolic rate, a four-chambered heart, and a strong yet lightweight skeleton. Birds live worldwide and range in size from the bee hummingbird to the ostrich. There are about ten thousand living species, more than half of which are passerine, or "perching" birds. Birds have whose development varies according to species; the only known groups without wings are the extinct moa and elephant birds. Wings, which are modified forelimbs, gave birds the ability to fly, although further evolution has led to the loss of flight in some birds, including ratites, penguins, and diverse endemic island species. The digestive and respiratory systems of birds are also uniquely adapted for flight. Some bird species of aquatic environments, particularly seabirds and some waterbirds, have further evolved for swimming. Bi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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