Africa Wild Bird Book

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476. Lesser Honeyguide Indicator minor (Kleinheuningwyser)
Order: Piciformes. Family: Indicatoridae

Lesser Honeyguide Indicator minor.jpg (15.65 KiB) Viewed 1011 times

Description
Size smallish (smaller than Greater and Scaly-throated Honeyguides) 15-16 cm; head and breast grey, shading to white on belly; back olive grey with gold wash; tail dark, outer rectrices white (conspicuous in flight); malar stripe blackish. Iris dark brown; bill blackish horn, base pinkish; legs and feet olive grey.
Juvenile: Darker below than adult; tail feathers pointed, outermost more extensively white.

Distribution
Occurs across much of sub-Saharan Africa, excluding dense forest and arid areas. In southern Africa, it is absent from large areas of Botswana, Mozambique and Namibia.



Taxonomy
Indicator minor has 6 subspecies:
I. m. minor South Africa, south-eastern Botswana, Swaziland;
I. m. senegalensis Senegal, Chad, Cameroon, Sudan;
I. m. riggenbachi Cameroon, Sudan, Uganda;
I. m. diadematus Sudan, Ethiopia, Somalia;
I. m. damarensis Angola, Namibia;
I. m. teitensis Democratic Rep. of Congo, Angola, Kenya, Uganda, Mozambique, Zimbabwe and lowlands of eastern South Africa.

Habitat
It generally prefers woodland, savanna, riverine forest, forest edges, plantations and gardens.

Diet
It feeds on a wide variety of insects, as well as a number of products and adults of Apis mellifera (Honey bee). Unlike other honeyguides, it does not lead mammals to bees nests. It feeds on insects in crevices, bark, leaves and branches, and is also highly adept at finding dry honeycombs.

Breeding
It is a brood parasite, meaning that it lays its eggs in other bird nests, which are usually other hole & cavity nesters such as Barbets & Bee-eaters. The host, thinking that the egg is its own, incubates the egg, and cares for the chick. It is also polygynous, as it may have multiple mates at the same time. Egg-laying season from August-February, peaking from October-November. The parasitising process involves either the breeding pair or just the female. If there are both, the male distracts the host bird while the female rushes into the nest, laying one egg before the pair leave. If it is just the female, she simply lays its egg while the host bird is out. The eggs are laid in series of 2-7, each in a different nest, laying about 18-20 eggs in the whole breeding season. Soon after the chick hatches it viciously kills the host birds chicks, with extraordinary strength. It stays in the nest for about 37-38 days before becoming independent.

Call
Series of 10-30 far-carrying piping unmusical ki-link ki-link ki-link notes; pauses about half minute between series; each series starts with sharp tweet or kew note; display flight in undulating circles accompanied by single whurrr, probably made by tail feathers.

Status
Common resident.

[Toko]

476. Lesser Honeyguide Indicator minor

© Dindingwe
Biyamiti Bush Camp, Kruger National Park

© 100ponder
Amanzimtoti, KwaZulu-Natal

Links:
Species text Sabap1
Sabap2
NEWMAN'S VOELS VAN SA (8ste UIT)

[Dewi]

475. Scaly-throated Honeyguide Indicator variegatus (Gevlekte Heuningwyser)
Order: Piciformes. Family: Indicatoridae

Scaly-throated Honeyguide Indicator variegatus.jpg (24.99 KiB) Viewed 1010 times

Description
18-19 cm. The only Honeyguide in the region to have the head, throat and breast mottled and speckled. Mostly dull olive-brown above with a browner wash to the head. The throat is yellowish white with fine, dark streaks and the breast is mottled. The forecrown is dark grey with whitish flecks. Heavily streaked greyish underparts.
Juvenile has washed greenish underparts and is more heavily marked below.
Similar species: It lacks the pale rump of the slightly larger Greater Honeyguide. Female Greater Honeyguide differs from Scaly-throated Honeyguide in having an unmarked throat and breast. When seen in the forest canopy it could be confused with Lesser Honeyguide, but the latter has moustachial stripes and lacks the mottled head and breast.

Distribution
Occurs across sub-Saharan Africa; in southern Africa it is fairly common but localised in central and southern Mozambique, eastern Zimbabwe, Swaziland and eastern and southern South Africa (in a long a narrow strip of coastal belt from the Eastern cape to KwaZulu-Natal).



Habitat
Forested areas.

Diet
Mainly eats beeswax, honeybees (Apis mellifera) and other insects, doing most of its foraging by hawking prey from a perch or by seeking out beehives.

Breeding
Territorial, polygynous and brood parasitic (laying its eggs in other birds' nests), as each male copulates with multiple females within his calling territory. Hosts nest in holes in trees and include Golden-tailed Woodpecker, Knysna Woodpecker, Cardinal Woodpecker, Olive Woodpecker, Black-collared Barbet, Whyte's Barbet, Yellow-rumped Tinkerbird. Egg-laying season is from September-January, peaking from September-December. It lays a single egg per host nest, which is probably incubated for about 18 days. The chicks are thought to kill the chicks of the host, leaving the nest after about 27-35 days and soon becoming fully independent.

Call
The main call (by the male) is a loud trill, trrrrrrrr, starting as a low croak and rising in pitch; it lasts 3-4 seconds and repeated at 20- to 68-second intervals. Listen to Bird Call.

Status
Fairly common resident.

[Dewi]

475. Scaly-throated Honeyguide Indicator variegatus

© Dewi

© Dewi

© Duke
iSimangaliso

© 100ponder
Female, Amanzimtoti, KwaZulu-Natal

© 100ponder
Male, Amanzimtoti, KwaZulu-Natal

Links:
Species text Sabap1
Sabap2

[Dewi]

474. Greater Honeyguide Indicator indicator (Grootheuningwyser)
Order: Piciformes. Family: Indicatoridae

Greater Honeyguide Indicator indicator.jpg (65.91 KiB) Viewed 931 times

Description
Size 18-20 cm. Sexually dimorphic.
Male is brown backed with an off white breast and belly with black bib. Lores black with a short, black eyestripe, pale ear coverts. Wings black with narrow white margins. Tail, centre feathers black, outers white with broad black terminal band. Eye black, bill bright pink, legs black.
Female is greyer backed with dusky lores, ear coverts washed greyish olive brown, no bib and has a blue-grey bill with black tip.
Juveniles have a dark cap with yellow wash on the underparts.

Distribution
It occurs across sub-Saharan Africa; in southern Africa it occupies Zimbabwe, Botswana, Namibia, Mozambique and the non-arid areas of South Africa. Its population has recently increased in the Western Cape, probably due to tree planting.



Habitat
Woodland, savanna, fynbos, grassland and plantations.

Diet
It mainly eats the products of bees, such as eggs, larvae and wax, as well as termite alates and other insects. Honeyguides are the only African birds that are able to eat beeswax (a practice known as cerophagy), as they have symbiotic micro-organisms that digest it. Like certain other honeyguides, it guides mammals to bees nests. Interestingly, it is known to only guide humans, although some consider Honey badger to also be guided.

Human-honeyguide interactions
The specialised relationship between the Greater Honeyguide and humans is an extremely rare example of animal–human cooperation that has evolved through natural selection. Bird and human collaborate to gain access to bees’ nests, from which humans acquire honey and honeyguides obtain wax. Honeyguides know where bees’ nests are located but cannot get at the wax by themselves, whereas humans aren’t nearly as good at finding bees’ nests, but have fire to subdue the bees and tools to open their nests. As a team, they can gain more food than either would on their own. The consequent mutualistic partnership between this bird and man is probably ancient – perhaps even older than our own species, given that our ancestors are thought to have mastered the use of fire up to 1.9 million years ago.
While the honeyguide–human mutualism was probably once common throughout sub-Saharan Africa, it is now much reduced. Honeyguides do
occasionally attempt to guide humans in many African countries, but very likely the mutualism only really thrives in a few remote areas where
people still rely on a regular supply of wild-harvested honey.

Breeding
It is a brood parasite, meaning that it lays its eggs in other bird nests, which are usually barbets. The host, thinking that the egg is its own, incubates the egg and cares for the chick. The following bird species are known hosts of the Greater Honeyguide: Golden-tailed Woodpecker, African Hoopoe, Common Scimitarbill, Green Wood-hoopoe, Black-collared Barbet, Crested Barbet, Brown-hooded Kingfisher, Striped Kingfisher, White-fronted Bee-eater, Little Bee-eater, Swallow-tailed Bee-eater, Southern carmine Bee-eater, Southern black Tit, Ashy Tit, Banded Martin, Greater striped Swallow, Ant-eating Chat, Cape Glossy Starling, Meves's Starling, Pied Starling, Yellow-throated Petronia.
Egg-laying season is from September-January, peaking from September-October. The female lays its egg while the host is not around, destroying any existing eggs already in the nest. The eggs are laid in series of 4-7, each in a different nest, laying about 21 eggs in the whole breeding season. The chicks stays in the nest for roughly 38 days, after which they are fed by the host for 7-30, usually 7-10 days. Interestingly, the host bird sometimes feeds the fledgling honeyguide, but then attacks it when it flies.

Call
A loud, ringing 2 note call with the same rythm as victor and loud rattle used as a guiding call for humans to bees nests. Listen to Bird Call.

Status
Fairly common resident.

[Dewi]

474. Greater Honeyguide Indicator indicator


Juvenile

© Flutterby
Rietvlei Nature Reserve, Gauteng

© 100ponder
Amanzimtoti, KwaZulu-Natal

© pooky
Zimbabwe, Gonarezhou National Park

Links:
Sabap2

[Toko]

The woodpeckers, piculets, wrynecks, and sapsuckers are a family, Picidae, of near-passerine birds.
A number of species exhibit sexual dimorphism in size, bill length and weight. Most species possess predominantly white, black, brown, green, and red plumage. In woodpeckers, many species exhibit patches of red and yellow on their heads and bellies, and these bright areas are important in signaling. Many woodpecker species have more prominent red or yellow head markings in males than in females.
Members of the family Picidae have strong bills for drilling and drumming on trees and long sticky tongues for extracting food. The bill's chisel-like tip is kept sharp by the pecking action in birds that regularly use it on wood. Species of woodpecker that use their bills in soil or for probing as opposed to regular hammering tend to have longer and more decurved bills. Due to their smaller bill size, many wrynecks will forage in decaying wood more often than woodpeckers. The long sticky tongues, which possess bristles, aid these birds in grabbing and extracting insects deep within a hole of a tree.
Many of the foraging, breeding and signaling behaviors of woodpeckers involve drumming and hammering using the bill. To prevent brain damage from the rapid and repeated impacts, woodpeckers have evolved a number of adaptations to protect the brain. These include small brain size, the orientation of the brain within the skull (which maximises the area of contact between the brain and the skull) and the short duration of contact. The millisecond before contact with wood a thickened nictitating membrane closes, protecting the eye from flying debris. The nostrils are also protected; they are often slit-like and have special feathers to cover them.
Woodpeckers and wrynecks all possess zygodactyl feet. Zygodactyl feet consist of four toes, the first (hallux) and the fourth facing backward and the second and third facing forward. This foot arrangement is good for grasping the limbs and trunks of trees. Members of this family can walk vertically up a tree trunk, which is beneficial for activities such as foraging for food or nest excavation. In addition to the strong claws and feet, woodpeckers have short strong legs. This is typical of birds that regularly forage on trunks. The tails of all woodpeckers except the piculets and wrynecks are stiffened, and when the bird perches on vertical surfaces, the tail and feet work together to support it.
The woodpeckers have a mostly cosmopolitan distribution, although they are absent from Australasia, Madagascar, and Antarctica. The true woodpeckers, subfamily Picinae, are distributed across the entire range of the woodpeckers. The wrynecks (Jynginae) have an exclusively Old World distribution, with the two species occurring in Europe, Asia, and Africa.
Overall, the woodpeckers are arboreal birds of wooded habitats. They reach their greatest diversity in tropical rainforests, but occur in almost all suitable habitats including woodlands, savannahs, scrublands, bamboo forests. Even grasslands and deserts have been colonised by various species. A number of species are adapted to spending a portion of their time feeding on the ground, and a very small minority of species have abandoned trees entirely and nest in holes in the ground. The Ground Woodpecker is one such species, inhabiting the rocky and grassy hills of South Africa.
Picidae species can either be sedentary or migratory. Many species are known to stay in the same area year-round, while others travel great distances from their breeding grounds to their wintering grounds. For example, the Eurasian Wryneck breeds in Europe and west Asia and migrates to the Sahel in Africa in the winter
The woodpeckers range from highly antisocial solitary species that are aggressive to other members of their species, to species that live in groups. Group-living species tend to be communal group breeders. In addition to these species, a number of species may join mixed-species feeding flocks with other insectivorous birds, although they tend to stay at the edges of these groups. Joining these flocks allows woodpeckers to decrease anti-predator vigilance and increase their feeding rate. Woodpeckers are diurnal, roosting at night inside holes. In most species the roost will become the nest during the breeding season.
The diet of woodpeckers consists mainly of insects and their grubs taken from living and dead trees, and other arthropods, along with fruit, nuts and sap from live trees. Ecologically, they help to keep trees healthy by keeping them from suffering mass infestations. The family is noted for its ability to acquire wood-boring grubs using their bills for hammering, but overall the family is characterized by its dietary flexibility, with many species being both highly omnivorous and opportunistic. The insect prey most commonly taken are those found inside tree trunks, whether they are alive or rotten, and in crevices in the bark. These include beetles and their grubs, ants, termites, spiders, and caterpillars. These may be obtained either by gleaning or, more famously, by excavating wood. Having hammered a hole into the wood, the prey is excavated by a long barbed tongue.
All members of the family Picidae nest in cavities. Woodpeckers and piculets will excavate their own nests, but wrynecks will not. The excavated nest is usually only lined from the wood chips produced as the hole was made. Many species of woodpeckers excavate one hole per breeding season, sometimes after multiple attempts. It takes around a month to finish the job. Abandoned holes are used by other birds and mammals that are secondary cavity nesters. Because nesting holes are in great demand by other cavity nesters, woodpeckers face competition for the nesting sites they excavate from the moment the hole becomes usable. This may come from other species of woodpecker, or other cavity nesting birds like swallows and starlings.
Members of Picidae are typically monogamous. A pair will work together to help build the nest, incubate the eggs and raise their altricial young. However, in most species the male does most of the nest excavation and takes the night shift while incubating the eggs. A nest will usually consist of 2–5 round white eggs. The eggs are incubated for about 11–14 days before the chicks are born. It takes about 18–30 days before the young are ready to leave the nest.

The African genus Campethera contains 12 species, which show a greenish coloration of the back and are also characterised by yellow shafts of the flight feathers. Sexual differences in coloration involve moustachial (malar) stripes and/or crown colour. In some species males possess red malar stripes; the crown of the males is red with more or less black streaking. Females lack red moustache, which is instead black or spotted black and white, crown with less or no red, often with white spots. Features related to arboreal feeding are moderately expressed: the bill is curved, mostly pointed or with only slightly developed chisel-tip; the hallux, the first toe, is rather short.

Also wholly African are the 14 species of the genus Dendropicos, which also often show some greenish coloration and in which most species possess yellow in the shafts of the flight feathers. Some species have yellow to gold, or red, rump or abdomen. Moustache, if present, not red in males. Males with red in crown or nape; no red in females, and only one species shows white spots in the frontal region. Rather arboreal, with strong claws, slightly or moderately curved bill, and short first toe.

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Family Picidae (Woodpeckers)
Jynx ruficollis Red-throated Wryneck 489
Campethera bennettii Bennett's Woodpecker 481
Campethera scriptoricauda Speckle-throated Woodpecker 482
Campethera abingoni Golden-tailed Woodpecker 483
Campethera notata Knysna Woodpecker 484
Campethera cailliautii Green-backed Woodpecker 485
Geocolaptes olivaceus Ground Woodpecker 480
Dendropicos fuscescens Cardinal Woodpecker 486
Dendropicos stierlingi Stierling's Woodpecker
Dendropicos namaquus Bearded Woodpecker 487
Dendropicos griseocephalus Olive Woodpecker 488

[Dewi]

489. Red-throated Wryneck Jynx ruficollis (Draaihalls)
Order: Piciformes. Family: Picidae

Red-throated Wryneck Jynx ruficollis.jpg (30.05 KiB) Viewed 1013 times

Description
19 cm. An overall brown bird with well defined barring on the upperparts and a well streaked buffy breast and belly. Throat is a rich rufous red, with rufous also on the vent.
The adult has grey-brown upperparts with variable black streaks and bars on forehead, scapulars, wing-coverts, tertials and uppertail-coverts. The wing-coverts are white-tipped. There is a black stripe from crown to mantle, conspicuous seen from behind. The flight feathers are dark brown and slightly barred rufous-white. The tail is brownish-grey and barred black and conspicuously edges white. On the underparts, chin, throat and upper breast are rufous-chestnut with variable extent. The central throat may be occasionally barred. Rest of underparts are whitish with dark brown shaft streaks. Flanks, lower belly and vent are washed buffy. Lower flanks and undertail-coverts are barred. The underwing is barred brown and pale rufous. On the head, lores and ear-coverts are barred brown and creamy-white, whereas the malar area is whitish and vermiculated brown. The crown is grey-brown with black shaft streaks. The bill is greyish-brown with darker tip. The eyes are brown. Legs and feet are brownish to dull greenish.
Both sexes are similar. The juvenile has duller throat with less extent of rufous. It is darker above, with more barring.

Distribution
It has populations scattered across sub-Saharan Africa, including one confined to South Africa and Swaziland. Within southern Africa it occurs from the Limpopo Province to the Eastern Cape.

Habitat
Prefers large, broadleaved trees, especially along watercourses.

Diet
Highly specialized, as it feeds exclusively on ants and termites. It often excavates ant nests, licking them up with its sticky tongue. This bird’s long tongue is capable of extending more than 60mm past the tip of the bill and covered with a sticky mucus secretion from the salivary glands. This weapon is flicked out at amazing speed to gather beakfuls of ants.

Breeding
The Rufous-necked Wryneck nests in natural holes in tree-trunks, usually an abandoned nest of barbet or woodpecker. It does not excavate the hole, and uses crevices in trunk, and sometimes nest-box. Egg-laying season is from August-February, peaking in October. The female lays 3-4 white eggs, up to 6 occasionally. The incubation lasts 12-15 days, shared by both parents which also care and feed the chicks together. The young are fed with ants and their larvae and pupae. The adults deliver large beakfulls of this food to the nest. The chicks stay in the nest for about 25-26 days. If threatened, an older chick will perform a threat display similar to a striking snake, extending its neck forward then rapidly recoiling. The juveniles become independent soon after fledging.
This species often rears two broods in a season. The nests are often parasitized by Indicatoridae species.

Call
The Rufous-necked Wryneck male gives long series of 5-10 loud, harsh notes kwik-kwik-kwik. The female utters lower-pitched series uit-uit-uit. They sing from perch in dead tree. We can also hear a low-pitched, guttural peegh repeated several times. The alarm call is a quiet klik. During the displays, they give long series of krok notes. Listen to Bird Call.

Status
Although a fairly common resident in some parts, this bird is seldom seen due to its shy nature.

[Dewi]

489. Red-throated Wryneck Jynx ruficollis

© Dewi

© Flutterby

© Flutterby
Rietvlei Nature Reserve, Gauteng


Links:
Sabap2: http://sabap2.adu.org.za/spp_summary.ph ... &section=3
Species text in The Atlas of Southern African Birds
BirdInfo: Red-throated Wryneck - ant-eating specialist, by Hugh Chittenden
Hans Winkler, David A. Christie. Woodpeckers