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Ground Roller
The ground rollers are a small family of bird migration, non-migratory near-passerine birds restricted to Madagascar. They are related to the kingfishers, bee-eaters and Coraciidae, rollers. They most resemble the latter group, and are sometimes considered a sub-family of the true rollers. Description Ground rollers share the generally crow, crow-like size and build of the true rollers, ranging from in length, and also hunt reptiles and large insects. They are more terrestrial than Coracidae species, and this is reflected in their longer legs and shorter, more rounded wings. They lack the highly colourful appearance of the true rollers, and are duller in appearance, with striped or flecked plumage. They are much more elusive and shy than their relatives, and are normally difficult to find in the Malagasy forests. Often the hooting breeding call is all that betrays their presence. These birds nest as solitary pairs in holes in the ground which they excavate themselves, unlike ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ranomafana National Park
Ranomafana National Park is in the southeastern part of Madagascar in Haute Matsiatra and Vatovavy. With more than 41,600 hectares (161 square miles) of tropical rainforest, it is home to several rare species of flora and fauna including the golden bamboo lemur, the greater bamboo lemur, black and white ruffed lemur and Milne-Edwards sifaka, and over 130 species of frogs. Bird species including ground rollers, blue vangas, short-legged ground rollers and brown mesites can be seen. The park was established in 1991 with the purpose of conserving the unique biodiversity of the local ecosystem and reducing the human pressures on the protected area. It is part of the World Heritage Site Rainforests of the Atsinanana. Adjacent to the park is the Centre ValBio research station, established in 2003 and managed by Stony Brook University with a focus on biodiversity research, community health and education, environmental arts and reforestation. The place name comes from the Malagasy ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Insect
Insects (from Latin ') are pancrustacean hexapod invertebrates of the class Insecta. They are the largest group within the arthropod phylum. Insects have a chitinous exoskeleton, a three-part body ( head, thorax and abdomen), three pairs of jointed legs, compound eyes and one pair of antennae. Their blood is not totally contained in vessels; some circulates in an open cavity known as the haemocoel. Insects are the most diverse group of animals; they include more than a million described species and represent more than half of all known living organisms. The total number of extant species is estimated at between six and ten million; In: potentially over 90% of the animal life forms on Earth are insects. Insects may be found in nearly all environments, although only a small number of species reside in the oceans, which are dominated by another arthropod group, crustaceans, which recent research has indicated insects are nested within. Nearly all insects hatch f ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Atelornis Pittoides -Zurich Zoologischer Garten-8a
''Atelornis'' is a small genus of birds in the ground-roller family Brachypteraciidae. The genus is endemic to Madagascar Madagascar (; mg, Madagasikara, ), officially the Republic of Madagascar ( mg, Repoblikan'i Madagasikara, links=no, ; french: République de Madagascar), is an island country in the Indian Ocean, approximately off the coast of East Afric .... Species There are two species: Bird genera Taxonomy articles created by Polbot Taxa named by Jacques Pucheran {{Coraciiformes-stub ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Long-tailed Ground Roller
The long-tailed ground roller (''Uratelornis chimaera'') is a species of bird in the ground roller family Brachypteraciidae, placed in the monotypic genus ''Uratelornis''. Endemic to arid spiny forests near the coast in southwestern Madagascar, this ground roller occurs at extremely low population densities throughout its habitat. This species requires shade and a deep layer of leaves on the ground, and it is absent from parts of the spiny forest lacking these features. It has no recognized subspecies, and its closest relative is the scaly ground roller. The long-tailed ground roller is the only ground roller to definitively display sexual dimorphism (differences in plumage or size between sexes). It is a medium-sized bird with a plump silhouette and a long tail. The upperparts are dark brown with black streaks while the underparts are light gray. The white throat is framed by black malar stripes and a black breastband, and a white stripe is present at the base of the bill. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Scaly Ground Roller
The scaly ground roller (''Geobiastes squamiger'') is a species of bird in a monotypic genus in the near-passerine family Brachypteraciidae. It is endemic to eastern Madagascar. Its natural habitat is subtropical or tropical moist lowland forest. The scaly ground roller is found at elevations below , and one of the few birds of Madagascar to reside in lowland rainforest. Morphology Scaly ground rollers grow to between . The head is covered with a black and white scaly pattern. It is a copper brown color and has green wings, with white tips. The center of the tail is reddish-brown, and has blue tips and black marks. The underside is pale, with black crescents. Its gray bill is thick and long, and its legs are pink in color. Ecology and behavior The diet of the scaly ground roller mostly consists of invertebrates it collects from the ground but it does also eat vertebrates it can find. It has been reported to chiefly eat earthworms ('' Pheretima'' sp.) and centipedes ('' Scolo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Naturalis Biodiversity Center - ZMA
Naturalis Biodiversity Center ( nl, Nederlands Centrum voor Biodiversiteit Naturalis) is a national museum of natural history and a research center on biodiversity in Leiden, Netherlands. It was named the European Museum of the Year 2021. Although its current name and organization are relatively recent, the history of Naturalis can be traced back to the early 1800s. Its collection includes approximately 42 million specimens, making it one of the largest natural history collections in the world. History The beginnings of Naturalis go back to the creation of the Rijksmuseum van Natuurlijke Historie (abbreviated RMNH, National Museum of Natural History) by Dutch King William I on August 9, 1820. In 1878, the geological and mineralogical collections of the museum were split off into a separate museum, remaining distinct until the merger of the Rijksmuseum van Natuurlijke Historie with the Rijksmuseum van Geologie en Mineralogie (abbreviated RGM) in 1984, to form the Nationaal N ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Extinct
Extinction is the termination of a kind of organism or of a group of kinds (taxon), usually a species. The moment of extinction is generally considered to be the death of the last individual of the species, although the capacity to breed and recover may have been lost before this point. Because a species' potential range may be very large, determining this moment is difficult, and is usually done retrospectively. This difficulty leads to phenomena such as Lazarus taxa, where a species presumed extinct abruptly "reappears" (typically in the fossil record) after a period of apparent absence. More than 99% of all species that ever lived on Earth, amounting to over five billion species, are estimated to have died out. It is estimated that there are currently around 8.7 million species of eukaryote globally, and possibly many times more if microorganisms, like bacteria, are included. Notable extinct animal species include non-avian dinosaurs, saber-toothed cats, dodos, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ampoza Ground Roller
The Ampoza ground roller (''Brachypteracias langrandi'') was a species of bird in the ground roller family Brachypteraciidae. It is known only from a single humerus fossil discovered in 1929 in southwest Madagascar. Little is known about the species, but it is suggested that the bird's habitat becoming more arid was a contributing factor in its demise. Taxonomy and systematics The genus name is derived from the Ancient Greek Ancient Greek includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Dark Ages (), the Archaic pe ... ''brakhupteros'', meaning short-winged.Jobling, J. A. (2017)''Brachypteracias'' in Key to Scientific Names in Ornithology In: del Hoyo, J., Elliott, A., Sargatal, J., Christie, D.A. & de Juana, E. (eds.) (2017). Handbook of the Birds of the World Alive. Lynx Edicions, Barcelona. (retrieved from www.hbw.com). Th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Short-legged Ground Roller
The short-legged ground roller (''Brachypteracias leptosomus'') is a species of bird in the ground roller family Brachypteraciidae. It is the only living species in the genus ''Brachypteracias'' and is endemic to Madagascar. It is threatened by habitat loss. Taxonomy and systematics The short-legged ground roller is the only extant species in the genus ''Brachypteracias'', although a fossil species, '' Brachypteracias langrandi'', has been described. The short-legged ground roller is more arboreal than other ground rollers, and may represent the ancestral form of the family.Langrand, O. (2017). Ground-rollers (Brachypteraciidae). In: del Hoyo, J., Elliott, A., Sargatal, J., Christie, D.A. & de Juana, E. (eds.). Handbook of the Birds of the World Alive. Lynx Edicions, Barcelona. (retrieved from http://www.hbw.com/node/52276 on 20 March 2017). The genus ''Brachypteracias'' once included the scaly ground roller, but a 2001 study of the DNA of the family found that the two are not cl ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Eocene
The Eocene ( ) Epoch is a geological epoch that lasted from about 56 to 33.9 million years ago (mya). It is the second epoch of the Paleogene Period in the modern Cenozoic Era. The name ''Eocene'' comes from the Ancient Greek (''ēṓs'', " dawn") and (''kainós'', "new") and refers to the "dawn" of modern ('new') fauna that appeared during the epoch. The Eocene spans the time from the end of the Paleocene Epoch to the beginning of the Oligocene Epoch. The start of the Eocene is marked by a brief period in which the concentration of the carbon isotope 13C in the atmosphere was exceptionally low in comparison with the more common isotope 12C. The end is set at a major extinction event called the ''Grande Coupure'' (the "Great Break" in continuity) or the Eocene–Oligocene extinction event, which may be related to the impact of one or more large bolides in Siberia and in what is now Chesapeake Bay. As with other geologic periods, the strata that define the start and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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