The pitohuis are bird species

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 elsew ...

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 ...

. The onomatopoeic name is thought to be derived from that used by New Guineans from nearby Dorey (

Manokwari Manokwari is a coastal town and the capital of the Indonesian province of West Papua. It is one of only seven provincial capitals of Indonesia without a city status. It is also the administrative seat of Manokwari Regency. However, under pro ...

), but it is also used as the name of a genus '' Pitohui'' which was established by the French naturalist

René Lesson René-Primevère Lesson (20 March 1794 – 28 April 1849) was a French surgeon, naturalist, ornithologist, and herpetologist. Biography Lesson was born at Rochefort, and entered the Naval Medical School in Rochefort at the age of sixteen. He ...

in 1831. The unitalicized common name however refers to

perching birds A passerine () is any bird of the order Passeriformes (; from Latin 'sparrow' and '-shaped'), which includes more than half of all bird species. Sometimes known as perching birds, passerines are distinguished from other orders of birds by t ...

that belong to several genera of multiple bird families. The genera include '' Ornorectes'', '' Melanorectes'', and ''

Pseudorectes ''Pseudorectes'' is a bird genus in the family Pachycephalidae endemic to New Guinea. Pseudorectes Extant species It contains the following species: * White-bellied pitohui (''Pseudorectes incertus'') * Rusty pitohui The rusty pitohui (''Pse ...

'' apart from ''Pitohui''.

Taxonomy and systematics

The Pitohui

species In biology, a species is the basic unit of classification and a taxonomic rank of an organism, as well as a unit of biodiversity. A species is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate s ...

were formerly all classified in the genus '' Pitohui'', which at the time was in the family

Pachycephalidae The Pachycephalidae are a family of bird species that includes the whistlers, shrikethrushes, and three of the pitohuis, and is part of the ancient Australo-Papuan radiation of songbirds. The family includes 64 species that are separated into f ...

. In 2013 they were separated into several different genera in several different families. The species are now separated into three families as follows:

Oreoicidae Oreoicidae is a newly recognized family (biology), family of small insectivorous songbirds from New Guinea and Australia, commonly known as the Australo-Papuan bellbirds. The family contains three genera, each containing a single species: ''Alead ...

* Crested pitohui ('' Ornorectes cristatus'')

Pachycephalidae The Pachycephalidae are a family of bird species that includes the whistlers, shrikethrushes, and three of the pitohuis, and is part of the ancient Australo-Papuan radiation of songbirds. The family includes 64 species that are separated into f ...

Black pitohui The black pitohui (''Melanorectes nigrescens'') is a species of bird in the monotypic genus of ''Melanorectes'' in the family Pachycephalidae. It is found throughout the highlands of New Guinea. Its natural habitat is subtropical or tropical mois ...

('' Melanorectes nigrescens'') * White-bellied pitohui (''

incertus'') * Rusty pitohui (''Pseudorectes ferrugineus'')

Oriolidae

Northern variable pitohui The northern variable pitohui (''Pitohui kirhocephalus'') is a species of pitohui in the family Oriolidae. It is found on New Guinea and a number of neighbouring islands. Its natural habitat is subtropical or tropical moist lowland forests. It ...

(''Pitohui kirhocephalus'') *

Raja Ampat pitohui The Raja Ampat pitohui (''Pitohui cerviniventris''), or Waigeo pitohui, is a species of pitohui in the family Oriolidae found on the western Papuan Islands of New Guinea. Its natural habitat is subtropical or tropical moist lowland forests. It ...

(''Pitohui cerviniventris'') *

Southern variable pitohui The southern variable pitohui (''Pitohui uropygialis'') is a species of pitohui in the family Oriolidae. It is found on New Guinea and neighbouring islands. Its natural habitat is subtropical or tropical moist lowland forests. It is also one o ...

(''Pitohui uropygialis'') *

Hooded pitohui The hooded pitohui (''Pitohui dichrous'') is a species of bird in the genus '' Pitohui'' found in New Guinea. It was long thought to be a whistler (Pachycephalidae) but is now known to be in the Old World oriole family (Oriolidae). Within the o ...

(''Pitohui dichrous'')

Description

Pitohuis are brightly coloured, omnivorous birds. The hooded pitohui has a brick red belly and a jet-black head. The variable pitohui, as its name implies, exists in many different forms, and 20 subspecies with different plumage patterns have been named. Two of them, however, closely resemble the hooded pitohui.

Behaviour and ecology

The skin and feathers of some pitohuis, especially the

variable Variable may refer to: * Variable (computer science), a symbolic name associated with a value and whose associated value may be changed * Variable (mathematics), a symbol that represents a quantity in a mathematical expression, as used in many ...

and

hooded pitohui The hooded pitohui (''Pitohui dichrous'') is a species of bird in the genus '' Pitohui'' found in New Guinea. It was long thought to be a whistler (Pachycephalidae) but is now known to be in the Old World oriole family (Oriolidae). Within the o ...

s, contain powerful

neurotoxic Neurotoxicity is a form of toxicity in which a biological, chemical, or physical agent produces an adverse effect on the structure or function of the central and/or peripheral nervous system. It occurs when exposure to a substance – specificall ...

alkaloid Alkaloids are a class of basic, naturally occurring organic compounds that contain at least one nitrogen atom. This group also includes some related compounds with neutral and even weakly acidic properties. Some synthetic compounds of similar ...

s of the

batrachotoxin Batrachotoxin (BTX) is an extremely potent cardio- and neurotoxic steroidal alkaloid found in certain species of beetles, birds, and frogs. The name is from the Greek word grc, βάτραχος, bátrachos, frog, label=none. Structurally-relate ...

group (also secreted by the

Colombia Colombia (, ; ), officially the Republic of Colombia, is a country in South America with insular regions in North America—near Nicaragua's Caribbean coast—as well as in the Pacific Ocean. The Colombian mainland is bordered by the Car ...

poison dart frog Poison dart frog (also known as dart-poison frog, poison frog or formerly known as poison arrow frog) is the common name of a group of frogs in the family Dendrobatidae which are native to tropical Central and South America. These species are ...

s, genus ''Phyllobates''). These are believed to serve the birds as a chemical defence, either against

ectoparasite Parasitism is a close relationship between species, where one organism, the parasite, lives on or inside another organism, the host, causing it some harm, and is adapted structurally to this way of life. The entomologist E. O. Wilson has ...

s or against visually guided predators such as

snake Snakes are elongated, Limbless vertebrate, limbless, carnivore, carnivorous reptiles of the suborder Serpentes . Like all other Squamata, squamates, snakes are ectothermic, amniote vertebrates covered in overlapping Scale (zoology), scales. Ma ...

raptor Raptor or RAPTOR may refer to: Animals The word "raptor" refers to several groups of bird-like dinosaurs which primarily capture and subdue/kill prey with their talons. * Raptor (bird) or bird of prey, a bird that primarily hunts and feeds on ...

s or humans. The birds probably do not produce batrachotoxin themselves. The toxins most likely come from the beetle genus ''

Choresine ''Choresine'' is a genus of beetles that belong to the Melyridae family. This genus of beetle is known to have high levels of batrachotoxins and is believed to be a possible toxin source for Pitohui and Blue-capped ifrit birds in New Guinea. Co ...

'', a part of the birds' diets. The birds' bright colours are suggested to be an example of

aposematism Aposematism is the advertising by an animal to potential predators that it is not worth attacking or eating. This unprofitability may consist of any defences which make the prey difficult to kill and eat, such as toxicity, venom, foul taste or ...

(warning colouration), and the similarity of the hooded pitohui and some forms of the variable pitohui might then be an example of

Müllerian mimicry Müllerian mimicry is a natural phenomenon in which two or more well-defended species, often foul-tasting and sharing common predators, have come to mimic each other's honest warning signals, to their mutual benefit. The benefit to Müllerian ...

, in which dangerous species gain a mutual advantage by sharing colouration, so an encounter with either species trains a predator to avoid both.(Dumbacher & Fleischer, 2001)

Relationship to humans

Due to the toxicity of these birds, Papua New Guineans call the pitohuis rubbish birds and do not eat them; in desperate times, however, they can be consumed only after the feathers and skin have been removed and the flesh is coated in charcoal and then roasted (Piper, 2007).

References

* del Hoyo, J.; Elliot, A. & Christie D. (editors). (2007). ''

Handbook of the Birds of the World The ''Handbook of the Birds of the World'' (HBW) is a multi-volume series produced by the Spanish publishing house Lynx Edicions in partnership with BirdLife International. It is the first handbook to cover every known living species of bird. T ...

''. Volume 12: Picathartes to Tits and Chickadees. Lynx Edicions. * * * *Piper, R. ''Extraordinary Animals: An Encyclopedia of Curious and Unusual Animals'',

Greenwood Press Greenwood Publishing Group, Inc. (GPG), also known as ABC-Clio/Greenwood (stylized ABC-CLIO/Greenwood), is an educational and academic publisher (middle school through university level) which is today part of ABC-Clio. Established in 1967 as Gr ...

External links

''Fugu, Poison Frogs, and Pitohuis'' by Harold B. White
*{{webarchive , url=https://web.archive.org/web/*/http://www.linkscampeoes.com.br/cur_animais/im_cur_ven_insetos/pass_pitohui.JPG , date=* , title=Picture of a hooded pitohui Bird common names Oreoicidae . . Endemic fauna of New Guinea Toxic birds

Taxonomy and systematics

Oreoicidae Oreoicidae is a newly recognized family (biology), family of small insectivorous songbirds from New Guinea and Australia, commonly known as the Australo-Papuan bellbirds. The family contains three genera, each containing a single species: ''Alead ...

Pachycephalidae The Pachycephalidae are a family of bird species that includes the whistlers, shrikethrushes, and three of the pitohuis, and is part of the ancient Australo-Papuan radiation of songbirds. The family includes 64 species that are separated into f ...

Oriolidae

Description

Behaviour and ecology

Relationship to humans

See also

References

External links