The beautiful fruit dove (''Ptilinopus pulchellus''), also known as the rose-fronted pigeon or crimson-capped fruit dove, is a small, approximately long, mainly green

fruit dove The fruit doves, also known as fruit pigeons, are a genus (''Ptilinopus'') of birds in the pigeon and dove family (Columbidae). These colourful, frugivorous doves are found in forests and woodlands in Southeast Asia and Oceania. It is a large gen ...

. It has a red crown, whitish throat, a greenish-yellow

bill Bill(s) may refer to: Common meanings * Banknote, paper cash (especially in the United States) * Bill (law), a proposed law put before a legislature * Invoice, commercial document issued by a seller to a buyer * Bill, a bird or animal's beak Plac ...

and purplish-red feet. It has a blue-grey breast and yellowish orange belly, with a reddish purple patch in between. Both sexes are similar. The beautiful fruit dove is distributed in rainforests of

New Guinea New Guinea (; Hiri Motu Hiri Motu, also known as Police Motu, Pidgin Motu, or just Hiri, is a language of Papua New Guinea, which is spoken in surrounding areas of Port Moresby (Capital of Papua New Guinea). It is a simplified version of ...

and the islands of Batanta, Waigeo, Salawati and

Misool Misool, formerly spelled Mysol (Dutch: Misoöl) or Misol, is one of the four major islands in the Raja Ampat Islands in Southwest Papua, Indonesia. Its area is 2,034 km2. The highest point is 561 m and the main towns are Waigama, located ...

in West Papua,

Indonesia Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania between the Indian and Pacific oceans. It consists of over 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, Java, Sulawesi, and parts of Borneo and New Guine ...

, primarily in flat terrain. The female usually lays a single white egg. Its diet consists mainly of various fruits from trees, palms and

vine A vine (Latin ''vīnea'' "grapevine", "vineyard", from ''vīnum'' "wine") is any plant with a growth habit of trailing or scandent (that is, climbing) stems, lianas or runners. The word ''vine'' can also refer to such stems or runners themselv ...

s. In the

Port Moresby (; Tok Pisin: ''Pot Mosbi''), also referred to as Pom City or simply Moresby, is the capital and largest city of Papua New Guinea. It is one of the largest cities in the southwestern Pacific (along with Jayapura) outside of Australia and New Z ...

area, birds were found to eat a mixed diet in May. Large ''

Tristiropsis canarioides ''Tristiropsis'' is a genus of about 14 flowering trees species, of the plant family Sapindaceae. Selected species * ''Tristiropsis acutangula ''Tristiropsis acutangula '' is a tree species of the genus ''Tristiropsis'' in the family Sapinda ...

'' fruit were taken when available, but the species gets displaced from fruiting trees by larger pigeons such as the

collared imperial pigeon The collared imperial pigeon (''Ducula mullerii'') is a large pigeon native to New Guinea and adjacent islands. Description The species has an average body length of 40 cm and weighs about 600 g. It has grey upperparts and largely grey-pink ...

(''Ducula mullerii''). Small '' Endiandra'' sp. fruit were very often eaten, but made up only a small quantity of food volume. Other food were '' Gymnacranthera paniculata'' and small quantities of ''

Polyalthia ''Polyalthia'' is a genus of flowering plants in the family Annonaceae. There are approximately 90 species distributed from Africa to Asia and the Pacific.

'' sp., ''

Livistona ''Livistona'' is a genus of palms, the botanical family Arecaceae, native to southeastern and eastern Asia, Australasia, and the Horn of Africa. They are fan palms, the leaves with an armed petiole terminating in a rounded, costapalmate fan of ...

'' palm fruit, and occasionally pepper ('' Piper'') berries. Despite their small size, they are able to swallow fruits of 5 cm³ volume, which would translate into a diameter of about 2 cm in spherical fruit. (Frith ''et al.'' 1976) Widespread and common throughout its large range, the beautiful fruit dove is evaluated as

Least Concern A least-concern species is a species that has been categorized by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) as evaluated as not being a focus of species conservation because the specific species is still plentiful in the wild. T ...

on the

IUCN Red List The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List of Threatened Species, also known as the IUCN Red List or Red Data Book, founded in 1964, is the world's most comprehensive inventory of the global conservation status of biol ...

of Threatened Species.

References

;Notes ;Bibliography *Frith, H.J.; Rome, F.H.J.C. & Wolfe, T.O. (1976): Food of fruit-pigeons in New Guinea. ''

Emu The emu () (''Dromaius novaehollandiae'') is the second-tallest living bird after its ratite relative the ostrich. It is endemic to Australia where it is the largest native bird and the only extant member of the genus ''Dromaius''. The emu' ...

'' 76(2): 49–58.