The elegant sunbird (''Aethopyga duyvenbodei'') is a large, up to 12 cm long,

Australasia Australasia is a region that comprises Australia, New Zealand and some neighbouring islands in the Pacific Ocean. The term is used in a number of different contexts, including geopolitically, physiogeographically, philologically, and ecologi ...

sunbird Sunbirds and spiderhunters make up the family Nectariniidae of passerine birds. They are small, slender passerines from the Old World, usually with downward-curved bills. Many are brightly coloured, often with iridescent feathers, particularly ...

in the genus ''

Aethopyga ''Aethopyga'' is a genus of birds in the sunbird family Nectariniidae. Species in this genus are found in South Asia, Southeast Asia and parts of China. Many species such as the grey-hooded sunbird, Apo sunbird, Apo sunbird, Tboli sunbird, me ...

''. The male has an iridescent blue-green crown, shoulder patch and uppertail coverts, yellow bar across lower back, red ear coverts, olive back, yellow throat, red neck collar and yellow below. The female has a yellowish olive upperparts, scaly crown and yellow underparts. The scientific name commemorates Maarten Dirk van Renesse van Duivenbode (1804–1878), Dutch trader of naturalia on

Ternate Ternate is a city in the Indonesian province of North Maluku and an island in the Maluku Islands. It was the ''de facto'' provincial capital of North Maluku before Sofifi on the nearby coast of Halmahera became the capital in 2010. It is off the ...

. An

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 ...

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also found else ...

, the elegant sunbird is distributed to the island of Sangihe, north of Sulawesi. It is found and locally common in the forests and plantations near

Mount Sahendaruman Mount Sahendaruman is an extinct volcano located in southern part of Indonesian island of Sangihe. It is an area high in biodiversity in Wallacea, especially seen in the small forest patch in mountain slopes Mount Sahendaruman, the last remaini ...

in southern Sangihe. Due to ongoing habitat loss, small population size and limited range, the elegant sunbird is evaluated as

Endangered An endangered species is a species that is very likely to become extinct in the near future, either worldwide or in a particular political jurisdiction. Endangered species may be at risk due to factors such as habitat loss, poaching and in ...

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

External links

BirdLife Species Factsheet

Red Data Book
Aethopyga Endemic birds of Sangihe Birds described in 1871 {{Nectariniidae-stub