Saturday, March 10, 2007
Toucan
Bill is bicolored with most of the upper mandible yellow, lower mandible and wedge-shaped area at base of upper mandible dark maroon-chestnut. Plumage is mostly black; rump white, under tail-coverts red, bare skin around eye yellowish green. Call is an almost gull-like repeated yelping ‘kee-yoo, tedick-tedick-tedick’.
Humid forest edge. Lowlands to 2000 meters in Central and nw South America (Honduras to western Equador).
Toucans are gregarious birds, usually seen in small flocks of 3 to 12 birds. Breeding is during the dry season. They nest in tree hollows. Incubation of the two to four eggs by both sexes lasts around 15 days. Young have particularly well-developed heel pads for shuffling about in the hard nest. These are lost by fledging at 40-50 days.
Their enormously enlarged bills which are used for plucking and manipulating tree fruits are lighter and less awkward than they look since they are largely hollow. The bill is strengthened by a honeycomb network of bony fibres within the horny outer sheath.
Humid forest edge. Lowlands to 2000 meters in Central and nw South America (Honduras to western Equador).
Toucans are gregarious birds, usually seen in small flocks of 3 to 12 birds. Breeding is during the dry season. They nest in tree hollows. Incubation of the two to four eggs by both sexes lasts around 15 days. Young have particularly well-developed heel pads for shuffling about in the hard nest. These are lost by fledging at 40-50 days.
Their enormously enlarged bills which are used for plucking and manipulating tree fruits are lighter and less awkward than they look since they are largely hollow. The bill is strengthened by a honeycomb network of bony fibres within the horny outer sheath.
# posted by saffron @ 4:44 PM 
