The Oriental stork (''Ciconia boyciana'';

Japanese Japanese may refer to: * Something from or related to Japan, an island country in East Asia * Japanese language, spoken mainly in Japan * Japanese people, the ethnic group that identifies with Japan through ancestry or culture ** Japanese diaspor ...

: コウノトリ ''Konotori'') is a large, white

bird Birds are a group of warm-blooded vertebrates constituting the class Aves (), characterised by feathers, toothless beaked jaws, the laying of hard-shelled eggs, a high metabolic rate, a four-chambered heart, and a strong yet lightweig ...

with black wing feathers in the stork family Ciconiidae.

Taxonomy

The species was first described by Robert Swinhoe in 1873. It is closely related to and resembles the European

white stork The white stork (''Ciconia ciconia'') is a large bird in the stork family, Ciconiidae. Its plumage is mainly white, with black on the bird's wings. Adults have long red legs and long pointed red beaks, and measure on average from beak tip to e ...

(''C. ciconia''), of which it was formerly often treated as a subspecies.

Description

It is typically larger than the white stork, at long, tall, a weight of and a wingspan of .''CRC Handbook of Avian Body Masses'' by John B. Dunning Jr. (Editor). CRC Press (1992), Unlike its more widespread cousin, the Oriental stork has red skin around its eye, with a whitish

iris Iris most often refers to: *Iris (anatomy), part of the eye *Iris (mythology), a Greek goddess * ''Iris'' (plant), a genus of flowering plants * Iris (color), an ambiguous color term Iris or IRIS may also refer to: Arts and media Fictional ent ...

and black

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 ...

. Both sexes are similar. The female is slightly smaller than male. The young are white with orange bills.

Distribution and habitat

The Oriental stork is found in Japan,

Manchuria Manchuria is an exonym (derived from the endo demonym " Manchu") for a historical and geographic region in Northeast Asia encompassing the entirety of present-day Northeast China (Inner Manchuria) and parts of the Russian Far East (Outer M ...

Korea Korea ( ko, 한국, or , ) is a peninsular region in East Asia. Since 1945, it has been divided at or near the 38th parallel, with North Korea (Democratic People's Republic of Korea) comprising its northern half and South Korea (Republic o ...

and

Siberia Siberia ( ; rus, Сибирь, r=Sibir', p=sʲɪˈbʲirʲ, a=Ru-Сибирь.ogg) is an extensive region, geographical region, constituting all of North Asia, from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east. It has been a ...

. It was once

extirpated Local extinction, also known as extirpation, refers to a species (or other taxon) of plant or animal that ceases to exist in a chosen geographic area of study, though it still exists elsewhere. Local extinctions are contrasted with global extinct ...

from Japan and the

Korean Peninsula Korea ( ko, 한국, or , ) is a peninsular region in East Asia. Since 1945, it has been divided at or near the 38th parallel, with North Korea (Democratic People's Republic of Korea) comprising its northern half and South Korea (Republic o ...

. However, in May 2007 a hatchling was reported in Japan for the first time in 40 years in the wild. It was an offspring of two storks who were bred in captivity.Endangered white storks hatch egg
Steve Jackson,

BBC News BBC News is an operational business division of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) responsible for the gathering and broadcasting of news and current affairs in the UK and around the world. The department is the world's largest broad ...

, 20 May 2007.

Conservation

Due to habitat loss and overhunting, the Oriental stork is classified 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 of Threatened Species. It is listed on Appendix I of

CITES CITES (shorter name for the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora, also known as the Washington Convention) is a multilateral treaty to protect endangered plants and animals from the threats of interna ...

. There have been efforts to reintroduce the storks to the wild, but there must be changes to the environment first. The storks were harshly impacted by the growth of the rice industry and the subsequent use of pesticides. There is a push for rice farmers to grow their plants organically so that the storks may breed and grow safely in their environments.

Diet and behaviour

The Oriental stork is a solitary bird except during the breeding season. It likes to wade in marshes, pond's edges, coastal beaches, and other wetlands. These birds are

apex predator An apex predator, also known as a top predator, is a predator at the top of a food chain, without natural predators of its own. Apex predators are usually defined in terms of trophic dynamics, meaning that they occupy the highest trophic lev ...

in their habitat. Its diet consists mainly of

fish Fish are aquatic, craniate, gill-bearing animals that lack limbs with digits. Included in this definition are the living hagfish, lampreys, and cartilaginous and bony fish as well as various extinct related groups. Approximately 95% of ...

frog A frog is any member of a diverse and largely carnivorous group of short-bodied, tailless amphibians composing the order Anura (ανοὐρά, literally ''without tail'' in Ancient Greek). The oldest fossil "proto-frog" ''Triadobatrachus'' is ...

insect Insects (from Latin ') are pancrustacean hexapod invertebrates of the class Insecta. They are the largest group within the arthropod phylum. Insects have a chitinous exoskeleton, a three-part body ( head, thorax and abdomen), three ...

s, small

s and reptiles, as well as rodents.

Breeding

The female usually lays between two and six eggs. After breeding, the storks migrate to eastern China in September and return in March.

References

External links

* ARKive
Images and movies of the Oriental stork (''Ciconia boyciana'')

* ttps://web.archive.org/web/20071106163313/http://www.rdb.or.id/detailbird.php?id=284 Red Data Book
BBC News bulletin about the birth of a chick in Japan

{{Authority control Ciconia Birds of East Asia Birds described in 1873