Doherty's bushshrike (''Telophorus dohertyi'') is a colourful but skulking species of bush-shrike of the family Malaconotidae which is found in forest habitats in north-central Africa. The common name and Latin binomial commemorate the American collector

William Doherty William Doherty (May 15, 1857 in Cincinnati – May 25, 1901 in Nairobi) was an American entomologist who specialised in Lepidoptera and later also collected birds for the Natural History Museum at Tring. He died of dysentery while in Nairobi. Tr ...

Description

A strikingly coloured, medium-sized bush shrike which in the adults is mostly green with a bright red forehead and throat, a broad black breast band and a bright lemon-yellow belly, the tail is black. Young birds are pale green above with finely barred yellow-green underparts.

Distribution

It breeds in central eastern

Democratic Republic of the Congo The Democratic Republic of the Congo (french: République démocratique du Congo (RDC), colloquially "La RDC" ), informally Congo-Kinshasa, DR Congo, the DRC, the DROC, or the Congo, and formerly and also colloquially Zaire, is a country in ...

Burundi Burundi (, ), officially the Republic of Burundi ( rn, Repuburika y’Uburundi ; Swahili language, Swahili: ''Jamuhuri ya Burundi''; French language, French: ''République du Burundi'' ), is a landlocked country in the Great Rift Valley at the ...

Rwanda Rwanda (; rw, u Rwanda ), officially the Republic of Rwanda, is a landlocked country in the Great Rift Valley of Central Africa, where the African Great Lakes region and Southeast Africa converge. Located a few degrees south of the Equator ...

, western

Uganda }), is a landlocked country in East Africa East Africa, Eastern Africa, or East of Africa, is the eastern subregion of the African continent. In the United Nations Statistics Division scheme of geographic regions, 10-11-(16*) territor ...

and western and central

Kenya ) , national_anthem = "Ee Mungu Nguvu Yetu"() , image_map = , map_caption = , image_map2 = , capital = Nairobi , coordinates = , largest_city = Nairobi , ...

Habits and habitat

Doherty's bush-shrike is a skulking species which is more often heard than it is seen. It is a solitary, skulking species which quietly moves around in dense undergrowth. The loud whistling territorial call is heard in all months of the year. There is a recorded observation of a Doherty's bush-shrike being chased by a

black boubou The black boubou (''Laniarius nigerrimus''), also known as Somali boubou, Erlanger's boubou or coastal boubou, is a medium-size bushshrike. It was split from the tropical boubou as a result of DNA sequence analysis,Nguembock, B., Fjeldså J., Co ...

. This species forages by searching dense undergrowth where it gleans from the vegetation and feeds on the ground on

arthropod Arthropods (, (gen. ποδός)) are invertebrate animals with an exoskeleton, a Segmentation (biology), segmented body, and paired jointed appendages. Arthropods form the phylum Arthropoda. They are distinguished by their jointed limbs and Arth ...

s, mainly

beetle Beetles are insects that form the order Coleoptera (), in the superorder Endopterygota. Their front pair of wings are hardened into wing-cases, elytra, distinguishing them from most other insects. The Coleoptera, with about 400,000 describ ...

s and

grasshopper Grasshoppers are a group of insects belonging to the suborder Caelifera. They are among what is possibly the most ancient living group of chewing herbivorous insects, dating back to the early Triassic around 250 million years ago. Grasshopp ...

s. The breeding season is between April and July in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and May and June in Uganda and Kenya. There are records of the barred juveniles being seen from November to March, a record of female on nests being found in Kenya in July and of a juvenile being fed in Rwanda in October. Otherwise its behaviour is little known. It is a highland species generally found between in altitude, the related and similar gorgeous bush-shrike is its lowland equivalent. Its habitat is dense scrub and undergrowth on the edge and in clearings in forest, also in dense

secondary growth In botany, secondary growth is the growth that results from cell division in the cambia or lateral meristems and that causes the stems and roots to thicken, while primary growth is growth that occurs as a result of cell division at the tips of ...

and humid thickets especially where there is

bracken Bracken (''Pteridium'') is a genus of large, coarse ferns in the family Dennstaedtiaceae. Ferns (Pteridophyta) are vascular plants that have alternating generations, large plants that produce spores and small plants that produce sex cells (eggs ...

and

bamboo Bamboos are a diverse group of evergreen perennial flowering plants making up the subfamily Bambusoideae of the grass family Poaceae. Giant bamboos are the largest members of the grass family. The origin of the word "bamboo" is uncertain, bu ...

mixed in.

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q1305539

Doherty's bushshrike Doherty's bushshrike (''Telophorus dohertyi'') is a colourful but skulking species of bush-shrike of the family Malaconotidae which is found in forest habitats in north-central Africa. The common name and Latin binomial commemorate the American ...

Birds of Sub-Saharan Africa Birds of East Africa

Taxonomy articles created by Polbot