Eared dove | |
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In Oranjestad, Aruba | |
Scientific classification | |
Domain: | Eukaryota |
Kingdom: | Animalia |
Phylum: | Chordata |
Class: | Aves |
Order: | Columbiformes |
Family: | Columbidae |
Genus: | Zenaida |
Species: | Z. auriculata |
Binomial name | |
Zenaida auriculata (Des Murs, 1847) | |
The eared dove (Zenaida auriculata) is a New World dove. It is a resident breeder throughout South America from Colombia to southern Argentina and Chile, and on the offshore islands from the Grenadines southwards. It may be a relatively recent colonist of Tobago and Trinidad. It appears to be partially migratory, its movements driven by food supplies. [2]
It is a close relative of the North American mourning dove. With that species, the Socorro dove, and possibly the Galápagos dove, it forms a superspecies. The latter two are insular offshoots, the Socorro birds from ancestral mourning doves, and the Galápagos ones from more ancient stock. [3]
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Cladogram showing the positions of the doves in the genus Zenaida . [4] |
The eared dove is 24 cm (9.4 in) long with a long, wedge-shaped tail, and weighs normally about 112 g (4.0 oz). Adult males have mainly olive-brown upperpart plumage, with black spots on the wings. The head has a grey crown, black line behind the eye, and the blue-black on the lower ear coverts. These black markings give the species its English and specific names. The underparts are vinous, and the tail is tipped with cinnamon. The bill is black and the legs dark red.
The female is duller than the male, and immature birds are greyish-brown, very dull, with pale barring. The species' call is a deep soft oo-ah-oo.
The eared dove is common to abundant in savannahs and other open areas, including cultivation, and it readily adapts to human habitation, being seen on wires and telephone posts near towns in Trinidad and Venezuela, in almost all public spaces of large urban areas such as Bogotá, Colombia, and feeding near beach resorts in Tobago.
Eared doves feed mainly on seed and grain [5] taken from the ground. They can be agricultural pests. When in season, agricultural plants such as wheat, rice, sorghum, maize and soybeans may comprise the entirety of the diet. [5] Echinochloa colona , a common savannah grass, and Croton jacobinensis are important seed food for these doves. [5] Their diet may also be augmented by animal foods, such as caterpillars, insect pupae, aphids and snails. [5] This is a gregarious bird when not feeding, and forms flocks especially at migration time or at communal roosts.
Its flight is high, fast, and direct, with the regular beats and an occasional sharp flick of the wings, which are characteristic of pigeons in general. It also has a breeding display with a steep climb and semicircular glide down to its original perch. It builds a small stick nest several meters up in a tree [6] and lays two white eggs. These hatch in 12–14 days with another 9 days to fledging. No fixed breeding season is seen in most of their range, and provided with plentiful food and habitat, birds breed almost continuously.
Eared doves provide the last big-bag shooting experience in the world. More than 23 million of these doves are thought to be in the fields around Córdoba in northern Argentina, and recent estimates put the figure in the 32-million range. Not uncommonly, a single gun can shoot 1000 birds in a day.
The scale of this wing-shooting recalls the numbers of passenger pigeons taken by North American gunners in the 1800s. That hunting pressure brought the passenger pigeon to rapid extinction, but the eared dove seems to be more resilient. Indeed, as with the passenger pigeons, eared dove populations in Argentina and Bolivia sometimes "darken the skies". Thus, populations on the sporting estates of Argentina seem to be holding their own, with the birds breeding four times a year and thriving on the vast areas of grain, some grown for their benefit, most of it on commercial farms, which are happy to support the dove shooting. Dozens of luxury lodges specialize in dove hunting, and the season extends all year long. [ citation needed ]
The eared doves around Córdoba do not migrate, and the enormous flocks are described as flying constantly between their roosting woods and the open fields. In the Córdoba region in Argentina, the eared doves are known as palomas doradas because of the shining feathers sometimes present in their plumage.
Further north, in Bolivia, around de Gran Chaco region, near the immense soy and sorghum plantations around Santa Cruz de la Sierra, the dove shooting is more seasonal, going from May to September, with large flocks arriving from Argentina to raid the grain crops. Locals attest that eared doves, which they call by the Guaraní name of totaky, were quite rare in the region just a few decades ago, a testimony not only to the resilience of the species, but also to the huge impact that the newly created large feeding grounds have on dove populations.
The passenger pigeon or wild pigeon is an extinct species of pigeon that was endemic to North America. Its common name is derived from the French word passager, meaning "passing by", due to the migratory habits of the species. The scientific name also refers to its migratory characteristics. The morphologically similar mourning dove was long thought to be its closest relative, and the two were at times confused, but genetic analysis has shown that the genus Patagioenas is more closely related to it than the Zenaida doves.
Columbidae is a bird family consisting of doves and pigeons. It is the only family in the order Columbiformes. These are stout-bodied birds with short necks and short slender bills that in some species feature fleshy ceres. They primarily feed on plants, and can be taxonomically divided amongst granivores, that feed mostly on the ground on seeds, and frugivores, that feed mostly on fruits, from branches. The family occurs worldwide, often in close proximity with humans, but the greatest variety is in the Indomalayan and Australasian realms.
The stock dove or stock pigeon is a species of bird in the family Columbidae, the doves and pigeons. It is widely distributed in the western Palearctic.
The mourning dove is a member of the dove family, Columbidae. The bird is also known as the American mourning dove, the rain dove, the chueybird, colloquially as the turtle dove, and it was once known as the Carolina pigeon and Carolina turtledove. It is one of the most abundant and widespread North American birds and a popular gamebird, with more than 20 million birds shot annually in the U.S., both for sport and meat. Its ability to sustain its population under such pressure is due to its prolific breeding; in warm areas, one pair may raise up to six broods of two young each in a single year. The wings make an unusual whistling sound upon take-off and landing, a form of sonation. The bird is a strong flier, capable of speeds up to 88 km/h (55 mph).
The Socorro dove or Grayson's dove is a dove species which is extinct in the wild. It was endemic to Socorro Island in the Revillagigedo Islands off the west coast of Mexico. The last sighting in its natural habitat was in 1972 and it survives only in captivity. A reintroduction program is being prepared.
The red-billed quelea, also known as the red-billed weaver or red-billed dioch, is a small—approximately 12 cm (4.7 in) long and weighing 15–26 g (0.53–0.92 oz)—migratory, sparrow-like bird of the weaver family, Ploceidae, native to Sub-Saharan Africa.
The tropical parula is a small New World warbler. It breeds from southernmost Texas and northwest Mexico (Sonora) south through Central America to northern Argentina, including Trinidad and Tobago. This widespread and common species is not considered threatened by the IUCN.
The ruddy ground dove is a small New World tropical dove. It is a resident breeder from Mexico south to Brazil, Peru and Paraguay, and northern Argentina, and on Trinidad and Tobago. Individual birds can sometimes be seen in the southwestern USA, from southern Texas to southernmost California, primarily during winter.
The pale-vented pigeon is a large pigeon found in the tropical Americas. Formerly often placed in Columba, it actually belongs to a clade of the older New World genus Patagioenas. With its relatives it represents an evolutionary radiation extending through most of the warm-temperate to tropical Americas. Grey-hued birds, even their males generally lack iridescent display plumage, although the present species has some coppery gloss on the nape.
The zenaida doves make up a small genus (Zenaida) of American doves in the family Columbidae.
The yellow-eyed pigeon, pale-backed pigeon, yellow-eyed dove or yellow-eyed stock dove is a member of the family Columbidae. It breeds in southern Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Afghanistan, north-east Iran and extreme north-west China. It winters in north-east Pakistan, Jammu and Kashmir and parts of Rajasthan. The bird has declined in numbers over the years, chiefly because of hunting, and it is listed as "vulnerable" by the International Union for Conservation of Nature.
The Zenaida dove is a member of the bird family Columbidae, which includes doves and pigeons. It is the national bird of Anguilla, where it is locally referred to as "turtle dove".
The white-winged dove is a dove whose native range extends from the Southwestern United States through Mexico, Central America, and the Caribbean. They are large for doves, and can be distinguished from similar doves by the distinctive white edge on their wings. They have a blue eyering, and red eyes. The plumage is brownish-gray to gray. Juveniles are duller in color, and have brown eyes. The call is likened to English phrase "who cooks for you". There are three subspecies. It was first described by George Edwards in 1743, and given its binomial name by Linnaeus in 1756. It was moved into the genus Zenaida in 1838.
The scaly-naped pigeon, also known as the red-necked pigeon, is a bird belonging to the family Columbidae. The species occurs throughout the Caribbean.
The snow pigeon is a species of bird in the genus Columba in the family Columbidae from hilly regions of central Asia. They are grey, black, pale brown and white birds and two subspecies are recognised: C. l. leuconota occurs in the western Himalayas from western Afghanistan to Sikkim and C. l. gradaria occurs in the mountains of eastern Tibet and from eastern Nan Shan (Qinghai) to Yunnan and extreme northern Myanmar. The birds forage in open country in pairs or small groups, feeding on grain, buds, shoots, berries and seeds. They roost at night on cliffs, breeding in crevices where they build untidy stick nests and lay a clutch of usually two white eggs. The International Union for Conservation of Nature has rated the bird's conservation status as being of least concern.
The scaled dove, also known as scaly dove, Ridgway's dove, mottled dove, and South American zebra dove, is found in Brazil, Bolivia, Argentina, Colombia, French Guiana, Paraguay, Trinidad and Tobago, and Venezuela. Its natural habitats are subtropical or tropical dry shrubland, subtropical or tropical moist shrubland, subtropical or tropical seasonally wet or flooded lowland grassland, and heavily degraded former forest.
Ducula is a genus of the pigeon family Columbidae, collectively known as imperial pigeons. They are large to very large pigeons with a heavy build and medium to long tails. They are arboreal, feed mainly on fruit and are closely related to the other genus of fruit-eating doves, Ptilinopus. Both genera display brightly coloured plumage, predominantly green, often with contrasting under-parts of purple, orange or red. Some Ducula have prominently swollen ceres. They have large gapes and swallow seeds whole, playing an important role in seed dispersal.
The Galápagos dove is a species of bird in the family Columbidae. It is endemic to the Galápagos Islands. It is fairly common and is found in a wide range of open and semi-open habitats, especially in the arid lowlands of the archipelago.