Anhinga

                         Anhinga - Wężówka amerykańska

Brazil, Pantanal, 2013

Description

The Anhinga sometimes called Snakebird, Darter, is a water bird of the warmer parts of the Americas. The word anhinga comes from the Brazilian Tupi language and means devil bird or snake bird. It is a cormorant-like bird with an average body length of 33 in, a wingspan of 46 in, and a mass of up to 3.0 lb. It is a dark-plumaged piscivore with a very long neck, and often swims with only the neck above water. When swimming in this style the name Snakebird is apparent, since only the colored neck appears above water the bird looks like a snake ready to strike. They do not have external nares (nostrils) and breathe solely through their epiglottis. The female Anhinga is similar to the male Anhinga except that it has a pale gray-buff or light brown head, neck, and upper chest. The lower chest or breast is a chestnut color and as compared to the male, the female has a more brown back.

Habitat

The Anhinga lives in shallow, slow-moving, sheltered waters and uses nearby perches and banks for drying and sunning. It's rarely found out of freshwater except during severe droughts. Generally not found in extensive areas of open water, though it may nest on edges of open bays and lakes. Breeds near freshwater, often in association with other water birds such as herons, egrets, ibises, storks, and cormorants. The Anhinga may also breed in saltwater colonies and feed in fresh water. Only birds that do not live in the extreme north and south of their range migrate and do so based on temperature and available sunlight. Anhinga will migrate towards the equator during winter but this range is "determined by the amount of sunshine to warm the chilled birds". Although not in their usual range, anhinga have been found as far north as the states of Pennsylvania in the United States.

Voice

Sounds of Anhinga

Diet

The Anhinga dives from the surface of the water and swims slowly underwater stalking fish around submerged vegetation. The diet consists of many small to medium-sized wetland fishes, with very small amounts of crustaceans and invertebrates. Anhinga typically spear fish through their sides with a rapid thrust of their partially opened bill. Usually stabs with both mandibles, but may use upper mandible only on small fish. The side-spearing habit of the Anhinga suggests that the usual hunting method is by stalking rather than pursuit.

Reproduction

The male begins nest construction before it has a mate, by placing large sticks and green material in the forks of trees. The male collects nearly all nesting the material, and the female then finishes building nest. The nest is a bulky platform of sticks, somewhat more compact than heron nests. It is often lined with fresh leaves, green twigs, willow leaves, and catkins. With age, excrement can build up on the outer rim of the nest giving it a white appearance. 
   The hatchling starts out bald but gains tan down within a few days of hatching. Within two weeks the tan down has been replaced by white down. Three weeks after hatching, the first juvenile feathers appear. Juveniles are mostly brown until first breeding after the second or third winter.


DID YOU KNOW? Unlike ducks, the Anhinga is not able to waterproof its feathers using oil produced by the uropygial gland. Consequently, feathers can become waterlogged, making the bird barely buoyant. However, this allows it to dive easily and search for underwater prey, such as fish and amphibians. It can stay down for significant periods.

 
 

Photos by others

Credits

Wikipedia, Cornell Lab of Ornithology

Razor-billed Curassow



Razor-billed Curassow - Czubacz Garbonosy 

Brazil, Pantanal, 2013

Description

  The Razor-billed Curassow (Mitu tuberosum) is a species of bird in the Cracidae family. It is found throughout a large part of the Amazon Rainforest, though largely restricted to regions south of the Amazon River. Unlike other members of the genus Mitu, its crissum is deep chestnut and the tail-tip is white.

Habitat

It is found throughout a large part of the Amazon Rainforest, though largely restricted to regions south of the Amazon River.

Voice

The Alagoas Curassow sporadically makes a high-pitched chirping sound.
Sound of Razor-billed Curassow
 
Diet

They eat a wide range of foods including seeds, fruit, nuts, worms and insects. 

Reproduction

 They lay two eggs per year, and the female incubates them alone. The young are born with full feathers and are mobile right after they hatch.

Credits
Wikipedia

African Jacana

African Jacana - Długoszpon Afrykański 

 Botswana, Okavango Delta, 2012

Description

African Jacanas (Actophilornis africanus) are waders in the family Jacanidae. The most conspicuous characteristic of these birds are their huge, grey feet and claws which enable them to walk on floating vegetation, especially lily pads. They are also very good swimmers and divers. They are about 30 cm long, but females are larger than males. They have chestnut upper parts with black wingtips, rear neck, and eye stripe. The under parts are also chestnut in the adults, only in juveniles they are white with a chestnut belly patch. The blue bill extends up as a coot-like head shield, and the legs and long toes are grey. The sexes look alike, but the female is a bit larger than the male.

Habitat

Jacanas are found worldwide within the tropical zone, and this species is found in sub-Saharan Africa. The African jacana is not migratory, but extremely nomadic, often in connection with changing water levels; in wet years, birds may show up on pans, from which the species has been absent for several years.

Voice

Sounds of African Jacana

Diet

African Jacanas feed on insects and other invertebrates picked from the floating vegetation or the surface of the water. The African jacana mainly feeds on insects and worms, but also other arthropods, including spiders and crustaceans, and mollusks. Seeds are sometimes taken. Foraging similar to the Wattled Jacana, though the species may also catch flies and other flying insects.

Reproduction

African Jacanas breed throughout sub-Saharan Africa. It is sedentary apart from seasonal dispersion. It lays four black-marked brown eggs in a floating nest.

The jacana has evolved a highly unusually polyandrous mating system, meaning that one female mates with multiple males and the male alone cares for the chicks. Such a system has evolved due to a combination of two factors: firstly, the lakes that the jacana lives on are so resource-rich that the relative energy expended by the female in producing each egg is effectively negligible. Secondly the jacana, as a bird, lays egg and eggs can be equally well incubated and cared for by a parent bird of either gender. This means that the rate-limiting factor of the jacana's breeding is the rate at which the males can raise and care for the chicks. Such a system of females forming harems of males is in direct contrast to the more usual system of leks seen in animals such as stags and grouse, where the males compete and display in order to gain harems of females.

The parent that forms part of the harem is almost always the one that ends up caring for the offspring; in this case, each male jacana incubates and rears a nest of chicks. The male African Jacana has therefore evolved some remarkable adaptations for parental care, such as the ability to pick up and carry chicks underneath its wings.

Did you know?
African Jacana have a polyandrous mating system, in which females can have multiple male partners. After mating and egg laying, the female leaves the nest site and may look for another mate while the male incubates and raises the young.

Photos by others

Credits

Wikipedia, Birds of Brazil (Wildlife Conservation Society)

African Goshawk

 

African Goshawk - Krogulec trzypręgowy

Botswana, Okavango Delta, 2012

Description

Goshawks are small and medium-sized hawks, often called Sparrow-hawks. The females are almost invariably much larger than the males – in some cases weighing twice as much also browner, and more heavily marked below (the bars being dark brown rather than rufous). The tail bars are less distinct, and more grey. Their wings are short and rounded; the tail usually quite long. They are well adapted for flying through dense bush. This is a very variable species, and has been split into several sub-species with regional color variations.

Habitat

This is generally the common large or medium-sized sparrow-hawk in the African forests. It lives in deep forest, secondary growth, river strips and, in East Africa, the denser savannahs and mountain forests. The African Goshawk is found in Africa south of the Sahara, in well-wooded and forested areas in East, South-Central and South Africa.

Voice

Sounds of African Goshawk 

Diet

Mostly birds, some mammals, and the rest occasional lizards, frogs and insects. By weight mammals would probably form a greater proportion of the food. Mammals as large as a full-grown mole rat, and birds as large as six-week-old domestic poultry are taken. The birds are mainly those of the forest, sometimes fledglings. It is a bold and successful poultry thief in forest villages. It takes a fair proportion of its food – mammals, frogs, and insects on the ground.

Reproduction

At the onset of the breeding season both sexes perform a display flight, a hundred feet above the forest canopy, but sometimes much higher, circling slowly with bursts of wing-flapping interspersed with glides, and calling ‘kwit’. This is most often in the early morning.
Nests are constructed annually, both sexes taking part, but sometimes an old nest is refurbished. It is made at any height from twenty to sixty feet above ground, well concealed in a thick-leaved tree. It is a small structure, up to two feet across and three feet deep. The cup, about nine inches across by three inches deep, is lined with finer sticks and green leaves. Two or three eggs are laid at three-day intervals. They are white or greenish white, sometimes sparsely marked with brown and lilac. The breeding season normally coincides with the latter part of the dry season, but sometimes extends well into the wet season. Incubation is carried out by the female only, and the period is 28 to 30 days. She sits very tight, and only leaves the nest about twice a day for brief spells. She is fed on the nest by the male.
The young hatch at two, three, or even four-day intervals, resulting in considerable variation in size. Feathers first show through the down at about fourteen days and they are full-feathered by twenty days. They attempt to tear up prey by themselves from six days onwards, but continue to be fed by the female up to 28 days, less frequently towards the end of the fledging period. They make their first flight from the nest tree at about 32 days.
After the young make their first flights they return to roost in the nest or in the canopy of the tree above it, for up to two weeks. Thereafter they will remain in the neighborhood of the nest for up to two months.

Photos by others

 

  

Credits

Planetofbirds.com, Birds of Brazil (Wildlife Conservation Society)

African Fish Eagle

African Fish Eagle - Bielik afrykański

Botswana, Okavango Delta, 2012

Uganda, 2016

Uganda, 2016

Uganda, 2016

Description

The African fish-eagle (Haliaeetus vocifer) is probably the most familiar bird of prey in Africa.  The adult is very distinctive in appearance with a mostly brown body and large, powerful, black wings. The head, breast, and tail of African Fish Eagles are snow white, with the exception of the featherless face, which is yellow. The eyes are dark brown in color. The hook-shaped beak, ideal for a carnivorous lifestyle, is yellow with a black tip. The plumage of the juvenile is brown in color, and the eyes are paler compared to the adult. The feet have rough soles and are equipped with powerful talons in order to enable the eagle to grasp slippery aquatic prey. 

Habitat

African Fish-Eagle lives near large streams, lakes and marshes. It can be found near coastal lagoons and dams, and in estuaries. Several examples of places where they may be resident include the Orange River in South Africa and Namibia, the Okavango Delta in Botswana, and Lake Malawi bordering its namesake country Malawi, Tanzania and Mozambique. 

Voice

Its distinctive cry is, for many, evocative of the spirit or essence of Africa. The call, shriller when uttered by males, is a weee-ah, hyo-hyo or a heee-ah, heeah-heeah. 
 
Sounds of African Fish Eagle

Diet

The African Fish Eagle feeds mainly on fish, which it will swoop down upon from a perch in a tree, snatching the prey from the water with its large clawed talons. The eagle will then fly back to its perch to eat its catch. But it also consumes carrion, eggs and chicks of shore birds, some aquatic birds (larger than flamingos), more rarely monkeys, lizards, frogs, sea-turtles or insects.  

Reproduction

Adult African fish-eagles are normally seen in pairs, but on large, productive lakes, nests and roosts may be only a few hundred meters apart, and many birds can be found together in one area. The stick nests are usually built in a tree close to water and are used year after year, growing in size over time with the addition of reeds, papyrus heads, bulrushes and sometimes weaver nests. Calling and duetting, whilst perched or soaring, is an integral part of the breeding display, and is combined with dramatic aerial dives and falls, with pairs interlocking talons in mid air. The female normally lays one to three eggs in the nest, which are incubated for around 44 days before hatching. Until the chicks fledge after around 65 to 75 days, it is necessary for the adults to spend considerably more time hunting for food, compared with other times of the year. In the wild, African fish-eagles that are fortunate to survive the first year have an estimated life expectancy of 12 to 24 years.


DID YOU KNOW?

The African Fish Eagle has two distinct calls. When near the nest its call is more of a "quock" sound - the female being, in all cases, a little shriller and less mellow than the male. So well known and clear is the call of this bird that it is often known as "the voice of Africa".


Photos by others

Sources
Wikipedia, The Free EncyclopediaOiseaux-birds.com
Arkive