Heart-spotted woodpecker | |
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Male | |
Scientific classification | |
Domain: | Eukaryota |
Kingdom: | Animalia |
Phylum: | Chordata |
Class: | Aves |
Order: | Piciformes |
Family: | Picidae |
Genus: | Hemicircus |
Species: | H. canente |
Binomial name | |
Hemicircus canente (Lesson, 1832) | |
Synonyms | |
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The heart-spotted woodpecker (Hemicircus canente) is a species of bird in the woodpecker family. It has a contrasting black and white plumage, a distinctively stubby body and a large wedge-shaped head making it easy to identify while its frequent calling make it easy to detect as it forage for invertebrates under the bark of the slender outer branches of trees. They move about in pairs or small groups and are often found in mixed-species foraging flocks. They have a wide distribution across Asia with populations in the forests of southwestern and central India which are slightly separated from their ranges in the Himalayas and Southeast Asia.
The heart-spotted woodpecker was described in 1832 by the French naturalist René Lesson from a specimen collected from Bago in Myanmar. He coined the binomial name Picus canente. [2] [3] The specific name is from Roman mythology: Canens was a sweet-voiced nymph, her husband was Picus. [4] The species is now placed in the genus Hemicircus that was introduced in 1837 by the English naturalist William John Swainson. [5] [6] The species is monotypic: no subspecies are recognised. [6]
A small, uniquely shaped, black and buff woodpecker with a large crest making the head look large for the short body and tail. Both males and females are predominantly black with heart-shaped black spots on white shoulders with broad white scapular patches and barring of flight feathers. The female has the forehead and crown buffy white while it is black on males. The throat is whitish and the underparts are dark olive grey. A tuft of feathers on the back are specialized and are lipid rich which causes the feathers to stick together in preserved specimens. [7] [8] These special feathers or "fat quills" sometimes make the rump feathers appear buff and may be a form of "cosmetic colouration" and the secretion is said to have a pleasant smell but the functional significance is unknown. [9] [10] [11] [12]
Its natural habitat is subtropical or tropical moist lowland forests. They are found in the Himalayan forests of India, and extend into Bangladesh, Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam. Within India, they are also found in the Western Ghats and the forests of central India. [13] A subspecies cordatus based on the description by Thomas C. Jerdon from a specimen from the Western Ghats is not considered distinct and the populations differ slightly in plumage colour and vary clinally in size (the northern birds being larger than those closer to the equator). [10] [14] [15]
These woodpeckers forage in pairs, sometimes joining mixed-species foraging flocks. They fly from tree to tree in a sharply bounding flight giving a head-heavy appearance. They forage on thin branches and call often. They feed mainly on insects under bark but have been known to peck the pods of Cassia fistula to obtain insect larvae. [16] The calls include a sharp twee-twee-twee (duet call) sometimes leading to a trill of several notes, [17] a nasal ki-yeew [18] and repeated su-sie calls. [19] They drum infrequently during the breeding season, mainly during winter and before the Monsoons. The nest is bored in a dead branch with a narrow 3 to 4 cm diameter opening and the tunnel going down obliquely about 20 cm before widening into a chamber. Nests may sometimes be built in fence posts. [20] The usual clutch is 2 or 3 eggs, which are unmarked white. [10] Ticks of the species Haemaphysalis spinigera have been noted on these birds. [21]
The hairy woodpecker is a medium-sized woodpecker that is found over a large area of North America. It is approximately 250 mm (9.8 in) in length with a 380 mm (15 in) wingspan. With an estimated population in 2020 of almost nine million individuals, the hairy woodpecker is listed by the IUCN as a species of least concern. Some nomenclature authorities, such as the eBird/Clements checklist, place this species in the genus Dryobates.
The red-wattled lapwing is an Asian lapwing or large plover, a wader in the family Charadriidae. Like other lapwings they are ground birds that are incapable of perching. Their characteristic loud alarm calls are indicators of human or animal movements and the sounds have been variously rendered as did he do it or pity to do it leading to the colloquial name of did-he-do-it bird. Usually seen in pairs or small groups not far from water, they sometimes form large aggregations in the non-breeding season (winter). They nest in a ground scrape laying three to four camouflaged eggs. Adults near the nest fly around, diving at potential predators while calling noisily. The cryptically patterned chicks hatch and immediately follow their parents to feed, hiding by lying low on the ground or in the grass when threatened.
The Malabar trogon is a species of bird in the trogon family. It is found in the forests of India and Sri Lanka. In India it is mainly found in the Western Ghats, hill forests of central India and in parts of the Eastern Ghats. They are insectivorous and although not migratory, may move seasonally in response to rain in hill forest regions. Like in other trogons, males and females vary in plumage. The birds utter low guttural calls that can be heard only at close quarters and the birds perch still on a branch under the forest canopy, often facing away from the viewer making them easy to miss despite their colourful plumage.
The blue-faced malkoha or small green-billed malkoha, is a non-parasitic cuckoo found in the scrub and deciduous forests of peninsular India and Sri Lanka. It has a waxy, dark, blue-grey plumage on its upperparts and has a long tail with graduated white-tipped feathers. The throat and chin are dark with spiny pale feathers that are branched. The lower belly is a dull creamy to rufous colour. The bill is apple green, and a naked patch of blue skin surrounds the eye. The sexes are alike. The blue-faced malkoha is a bird of open forests and scrub jungle.
The black-rumped flameback, also known as the lesser golden-backed woodpecker or lesser goldenback, is a woodpecker found widely distributed in the Indian subcontinent. It is one of the few woodpeckers that are seen in urban areas. It has a characteristic rattling-whinnying call and an undulating flight. It is the only golden-backed woodpecker with a black throat and a black rump.
The spotted dove is a small and somewhat long-tailed pigeon that is a common resident breeding bird across its native range on the Indian subcontinent and in Southeast Asia. The species has been introduced to many parts of the world and feral populations have become established.
The forest wagtail is a medium-sized passerine bird in the wagtail family Motacillidae. It has a distinctive plumage that sets it apart from other wagtails and has the habit of wagging its tail sideways unlike the usual up and down movements of the other wagtail species. It is the only wagtail species that nests in trees. They are found mainly in forested habitats, breeding in the temperate parts of east Asia and wintering across tropical Asia from India to Indonesia.
Loten's sunbird, also known as the long-billed sunbird or maroon-breasted sunbird, is a sunbird endemic to peninsular India and Sri Lanka. Named after Joan Gideon Loten, who was the Dutch governor of colonial Ceylon, it is very similar to the purple sunbird that is found in the same areas and also tends to hover at flowers for nectar, but can be distinguished by the longer bill, the maroon band on the breast and brownish wings. Like other sunbirds, it is also insectivorous and builds characteristic hanging nests.
The jungle myna is a myna, a member of the starling family. It is found patchily distributed across much of the mainland of the Indian Subcontinent but absent in the arid zones of India. It is easily recognized by the tuft of feathers on its forehead that form a frontal crest, a feature also found in the closely related Javan myna and the pale-bellied myna which were treated as a subspecies in the past. The eyes are pale, yellow or blue depending on the population and the base of the orange-yellow bill is dark. It has also been introduced either intentionally or accidentally into many other parts of the world including Fiji, Taiwan, the Andaman Islands, and parts of Japan. The species has also spread out on its own to some islands in the Pacific.
The greater racket-tailed drongo is a medium-sized Asian bird which is distinctive in having elongated outer tail feathers with webbing restricted to the tips. They are placed along with other drongos in the family Dicruridae. They are conspicuous in the forest habitats often perching in the open and by attracting attention with a wide range of loud calls that include perfect imitations of many other birds. One hypothesis suggested is that these vocal imitations may help in the formation of mixed-species foraging flocks, a feature seen in forest bird communities where many insect feeders forage together. These drongos will sometimes steal insect prey caught or disturbed by other foragers in the flock and another idea is that vocal mimicry helps them in diverting the attention of smaller birds to aid their piracy. They are diurnal but are active well before dawn and late at dusk. Owing to their widespread distribution and distinctive regional variation, they have become iconic examples of speciation by isolation and genetic drift.
The white-bellied woodpecker or great black woodpecker is a woodpecker species inhabiting evergreen forests in tropical Indian subcontinent and Southeast Asia. It is among the largest of the Asiatic woodpeckers and nests in large dead trees, often beside rivers. It has 14 subspecies, and many of its island forms are endangered, some are extinct. Populations differ in the distribution and extent of white. Its drums and calls are louder than those of the smaller woodpeckers.
The yellow-throated bulbul is a species of songbird in the bulbul family of passerine birds. The species is endemic to southern peninsular India. They are found on scrub habitats on steep, rocky hills many of which are threatened by granite quarrying. It is confusable only with the white-browed bulbul with which its range overlaps but is distinctively yellow on the head and throat apart from the yellow vent. The calls of this species are very similar to that of the white-browed bulbul.
The painted spurfowl is a bird of the pheasant family found in rocky hill and scrub forests mainly in peninsular India. Males are more brightly coloured and spotted boldly in white. Males have two to four spurs while females can have one or two of the spurs on their tarsus. The species is found mainly in rocky and scrub forest habitats unlike the red spurfowl. It is found in the undergrowth in pairs or small groups, escaping by running and rarely taking to the wing when flushed.
The rufous woodpecker is a medium-sized brown woodpecker native to South and Southeast Asia. It is short-billed, foraging in pairs on small insects, particularly ants and termites, in scrub, evergreen, and deciduous forests and is noted for building its nest within the carton nests of arboreal ants in the genus Crematogaster. It was for sometime placed in the otherwise Neotropical genus Celeus but this has been shown to be a case of evolutionary convergence and molecular phylogenetic studies support its placement in the monotypic genus Micropternus.
The common hawk-cuckoo, popularly known as the brainfever bird, is a medium-sized cuckoo resident in the Indian subcontinent. It bears a close resemblance to the Shikra, even in its style of flying and landing on a perch. The resemblance to hawks gives this group the generic name of hawk-cuckoo and like many other cuckoos these are brood parasites, laying their eggs in nests of babblers. During their breeding season in summer males produce loud, repetitive three note calls that are well-rendered as brain-fever, the second note being longer and higher pitched. These notes rise to a crescendo before ending abruptly and repeat after a few minutes; the calling may go on through the day, well after dusk and before dawn.
The black baza is a small bird of prey found in the forests of Northeast India, the eastern Himalayas, China and Southeast Asia. Many populations are migratory, including those in the Indian region, which winter in the south of the Peninsula and Sri Lanka. Black bazas have short, stout legs and feet with strong talons, and a prominent crest. They are found in dense forest, often in small groups, and can often be found perched on bare branches of tall trees rising above the forest canopy.
Hemicircus is a genus of birds in the woodpecker family Picidae. Members of the genus are found in India and Southeast Asia.
The grey-and-buff woodpecker is a species of bird in the family Picidae. It is found in Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, southern Myanmar, and southern Thailand, but has become regionally extinct in Singapore. Its natural habitats are lowland and montane tropical or subtropical moist broadleaf forests.