The puffbirds and their relatives in the

near passerine Near passerines and higher land-bird assemblage are terms of traditional, pre-cladistic taxonomy that have often been given to tree-dwelling birds or those most often believed to be related to the true passerines (order Passeriformes) owing to mor ...

family Bucconidae are tropical tree-dwelling insectivorous birds that are found from

South America South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere at the northern tip of the continent. It can also be described as the sout ...

up to

Mexico Mexico ( Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Gua ...

. Together with their closest relatives, the jacamars, they form a divergent lineage within the order

Piciformes Nine families of largely arboreal birds make up the order Piciformes , the best-known of them being the Picidae, which includes the woodpeckers and close relatives. The Piciformes contain about 71 living genera with a little over 450 species, o ...

, though the two families are sometimes elevated to a separate order Galbuliformes. Lacking the iridescent colours of the jacamars, puffbirds are mainly brown, rufous or grey, with large heads, large eyes, and flattened bills with a hooked tip. Their loose, abundant plumage and short tails makes them look stout and puffy, giving rise to the English name of the family. The species range in size from the rufous-capped nunlet, at and , to the white-necked puffbird, at up to and .

Taxonomy and naming

Puffbirds get their common name from their fluffy plumage. In Spanish, they have been nicknamed ''bobo'' ("dummy") from their propensity to sit motionless waiting for prey. American naturalist

Thomas Horsfield Thomas Horsfield (May 12, 1773 – July 24, 1859) was an American physician and naturalist who worked extensively in Indonesia, describing numerous species of plants and animals from the region. He was later a curator of the East India Compan ...

defined the Bucconidae in 1821. The family was classified as part of the Piciformes by

Alexander Wetmore Frank Alexander Wetmore (June 18, 1886 – December 7, 1978) was an American ornithologist and avian paleontologist. He was the sixth Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution. Early life and education The son of a Country Physician, Frank ...

in his work ''A Systematic Classification for the Birds of the World'' (1930, revised in 1951 and 1960). The placement of the combined puffbird and jacamar lineage was in question, with some bone and muscle features suggesting they may be more closely related to the

Coraciiformes The Coraciiformes are a group of usually colourful birds including the kingfishers, the bee-eaters, the rollers, the motmots, and the todies. They generally have syndactyly, with three forward-pointing toes (and toes 3 & 4 fused at their base) ...

. However, analysis of

nuclear DNA Nuclear DNA (nDNA), or nuclear deoxyribonucleic acid, is the DNA contained within each cell nucleus of a eukaryotic organism. It encodes for the majority of the genome in eukaryotes, with mitochondrial DNA and plastid DNA coding for the rest. ...

in a 2003 study placed them as

sister group In phylogenetics, a sister group or sister taxon, also called an adelphotaxon, comprises the closest relative(s) of another given unit in an evolutionary tree. Definition The expression is most easily illustrated by a cladogram: Taxon A and ...

to the rest of the Piciformes, also showing that the groups had developed zygodactyl feet (two toes facing forward and two aft) before separating. Per Ericson and colleagues, in analysing genomic DNA, confirmed that puffbirds and jacamars were sister groups and their place in Piciformes. The lineage is sometimes elevated to order level as Galbuliformes, first proposed by Sibley and Ahlquist in 1990. Molecular investigation of the Bucconidae in 2004 indicated that the nunlets (genus '' Nonnula'') diverged from the common ancestor of other puffbirds an estimated 25 million years ago, with the genus '' Malacoptila'' the next to branch off around 19.1 million years ago. A fossil right wing recovered from Lower Eocene beds in Lincoln County Wyoming was initially classified as a puffbird and given the name '' Primobucco mcgrewi''. However, the discovery of more complete specimens, including twelve in 2010, has indicated that ''Primobucco'' was instead an early type of roller.

Distribution and habitat

Puffbirds are found from Mexico to southern Brazil, with the greatest variety of species found in the

Amazon Basin The Amazon basin is the part of South America drained by the Amazon River and its tributaries. The Amazon drainage basin covers an area of about , or about 35.5 percent of the South American continent. It is located in the countries of Boli ...

. They live in forested or wooded habitats, including lowland, foothills, and open woodland. The white-faced nunbird is the only member of this species known to live in highlands. The swallow-winged puffbird also lives in more open country. No species of puffbirds have been recorded of moving any significant distance beyond its home territory.

Description

Generally dull-plumaged birds, puffbirds may have brightly colored bills, eyebrows and irises. They have large heads, short wings and strong bills, with short legs and diminutive feet. There is some sexual dimorphism; the female is slightly larger and slightly duller-plumaged than the male. Juvenile birds have shorter beaks.

Voice

Puffbirds are one of the most silent birds in the Neotropics and vocalize very rarely. The most vocal species are the nunbirds and those in the genus '' Nystalus''. When calling they mostly do so at dawn and dusk. The main vocalizations consist of repeated and high-pitched whistles. The nunbirds are the most vocal of the family; they have a wide repertoire of calls and often give very loud shouts.

Behavior

Puffbirds are by nature arboreal. Mostly secretive, they are found singly or in small family groups. Species of the genus ''Monasa'', known as nunbirds, are more gregarious and found in flocks.

Feeding

Puffbirds are sit-and-wait hunters, perching unmoving for long periods, while watching for insect prey. As well as

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

s, they may eat small lizards and plant material. Arthropod exoskeletons are regurgitated as pellets. The swallow-winged puffbird is the only member in the family that is known to capture insects from open perches.

Breeding

The breeding behaviour of puffbirds is not well known. Nests are burrows in dirt, rotten wood or termite mounds. Puffbirds are known to lay clutches of two or three eggs. The eggs are round, small, and white. The incubation period is around 15 days, and performed by both parents. Born blind and naked, the young can crawl to the entrance of the nest burrow at one or two days of age. There, their mother feeds them partly chewed insects. They fledge at around 20 to 21 days.

Species

References

* Stiles and Skutch, ''A guide to the birds of Costa Rica''

External links

Internet Bird Collection.com: Puffbird−Bucconidae videos
{{Taxonbar, from=Q621861 . Birds of Central America Birds of South America Taxa named by Thomas Horsfield