Helmet quail
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Helmet quail ( Callipepla gambelii ), portrait of a male |
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| Callipepla gambelii | ||||||||||||
| ( Gambel , 1843) |
The helmet quail ( Callipepla gambelii ) is a species of fowl in the toothed quail family found in the southwestern United States and northwestern Mexico .
features
With a length of 23–27 cm, the helmet quail is on average somewhat smaller than a partridge . Males weigh an average of 161 g, females 156 g. The most striking feature is the comma-shaped black hood that protrudes from the forehead. The wings are rounded and the tail is medium in length. The beak is blackish; the legs and feet are gray. The iris is dark brown. The sexes can be easily distinguished from one another.
In the male, the hood, forehead and the front part of the face are blackish except for the throat. A diadem-like white band stretches across the forehead above the eyes to the sides of the neck. Running down from just behind the eye, another white band surrounds the black throat area. The parietal plumage is lively chestnut brown, the rest of the upper side and the breast are blue-gray with fine scales on the neck and dark shaft lines. The underside is yellowish isabel with a blackish spot in the middle of the abdomen. The rear flank feathers and under tail-coverts are yellowish-white with broad, dark shaft lines. The front flanks are chestnut brown with white shaft lines that widen in the shape of a spatula towards the tip. The wings are mostly brownish. The umbrella feathers and inner arm wings have whitish inner plume hems, the other arm feathers are lined narrower light on the inner flag. The wings of the hand are light olive brown with gray outer flags. The control springs are medium gray.
The female resembles the male, but is generally more brown in color than the male. The part of the face and the parting are colored gray-brown, the throat area is dashed with whitish lines and the white facial markings are only hinted at. The head is smaller and more brownish-black. The black spot on the middle of the abdomen is missing.
Birds in juvenile plumage are similar to females, but are camouflaged gray-brown-white-black on the top and do not yet have the conspicuous flank markings of the adult birds.
The species is similar to the closely related crested quail , but is slightly larger and more gray. The belly is yellowish-beige in both sexes and does not have a scale pattern as in the crested quail. The male also has a black forehead, a chestnut-colored crown and equally colored flanks as well as a central, black spot on the belly. Hybrids also occur in the overlap area of the two distribution areas. They show features of both species such as a scaled belly with a dark center point.
distribution
The distribution area of the helmet quail extends from the eastern center of California over the southern Nevada and Utah to the western center of Colorado and south to the southeastern California, through Arizona and New Mexico in the extreme southwest of Texas . It also extends in Mexico over the northeast of Baja California , through Sonora including the Isla Tiburón , the coastal areas of Sinaloa and the north of Chihuahua . The helmet quail was introduced to Hawaii , San Clemente Island and in the north-central part of Idaho.
Geographic variation
Up to seven subspecies are recognized, which differ in the gray tone of the upper side and the beige color of the lower side.
- C. g. gambelii ( Gambel , 1843) - southern Utah and Nevada south to Baja California
- C. g. sana ( Mearns , 1914) - western Colorado
- C. g. ignoscens ( Friedmann , 1943) - southern New Mexico and far west Texas
- C. g. pembertoni ( van Rossem , 1932) - Isla Tiburon
- C. g. fulvipectus Nelson , 1899 - North-central to southwest of Sonora, possibly including southeastern Arizona and southwestern New Mexico
- C. g. stephensi ( Phillips, AR , 1959) - southern Sonora
- C. g. friedmanni ( Moore, RT , 1947) - Coastal Areas and Northwestern Sinaloa
habitat
The helmet quail lives in desert areas with shrub vegetation. It is a characteristic species of the Sonoran Desert and is also found in the Mojave Desert . The three main desert forms that it inhabits include hot valleys with mesquite trees , arid highlands with a vegetation of acacias , palm lilies and opuntia, and mugwort steppes in cooler climates with winter temperatures reaching below freezing point. Occasionally it also occurs on rivers overgrown with bushes or in irrigated cultivated land. In the absence of fresh or succulent plants, the species can rely on the availability of watering holes. The height distribution extends from the plain up to 1800 m.
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Reproduction
The helmet quail is monogamous . However, due to the high mortality rate, birds often have to find new partners every year. The breeding season is between late April and August. Second broods have been documented. The nest is a simple hollow on the ground that is scratched under protective vegetation. The clutch consists of 9–16 (rarely up to 19) eggs which are speckled brown or purple-brown on a cream-colored to beige background and are 32 × 24 mm in size. The hen lays 4–6 eggs on each of three days, with an interval of one day between the three days. The incubation lasts 23 days, with only the female incubating. The male guards the female and also takes over some of the rearing of the young. Sometimes, meanwhile, the female produces a second clutch.
Duration
Little data is available on the population of the helmet quail. The species is not threatened, however, and populations in the USA have apparently been stable since the 1960s. Since it plays an important role as game, the habitats are accordingly preserved and cared for in many places. On the other hand, it is also less susceptible to agricultural use than related species. However, intensive grazing can lead to declines locally. Little is known about the population in Mexico, but the species does not seem to be threatened here either.
literature
- Steve Madge, Phil McGowan : Pheasants, Partridges & Grouse. Helm Identification Guides, Christopher Helm, London 2002, ISBN 0-7136-3966-0 , p. 393f.
- Heinz-Sigurd Raethel : Chicken birds of the world. Verlag J. Neumann-Neudamm GmbH & Co. KG, Melsungen 1988, ISBN 3-7888-0440-8 , pp. 147-150.
- JP Carroll, Arnau Bonan: Gambel's Quail (Callipepla gambelii). In: Josep del Hoyo , Andrew Elliott, David A. Christie : Handbook of the Birds of the World . Volume 2: New World Vultures to Guineafowl. Lynx Edicions 1994 (Revision 2013), p. 424.
- Allan Robert Phillips: Las subspecies de la Codorniz de Gambel y the problema de los cambios climaticos in Sonora . In: Anales del Instituto de Biología de la Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México . tape 29 , 1959, pp. 361-374 .
- Adriaan Joseph van Rossem: The Avifauna of Tiburon Island, Sonora, Mexico, with description of four new races . In: Transactions of the San Diego Society of Natural History . tape 7 , no. 30 , 1932, pp. 119–150 ( online [accessed October 21, 2015]).
- William Gambel: Description of some new rare Birds of Rocky Mountains and California . In: Proceedings of The Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia . tape 1 , 1843, p. 258–263 ( online [accessed October 21, 2015]).
- Herbert Friedmann: Critical notes on the avian genus Lophortyx . In: Journal of the Washington Academy of Sciences . tape 33 , 1943, pp. 369–371 ( online [accessed October 21, 2015]).
- Edward William Nelson: Descriptions of New Birds from Mexico . In: The Auk . tape 16 , no. 1 , 1899, p. 25–31 ( online (PDF; 9265.85 kB) [accessed on October 21, 2015]).
- Robert Thomas Moore: New species of parrot and race of quail from Mexico . In: Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington . tape 60 , 1947, pp. 27–28 ( online [accessed October 21, 2015]).
- Edgar Alexander Mearns: Diagnosis of a new subspecies of Gambel's Quail from Colorado . In: Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington . tape 27 , 1914, pp. 113–114 ( online [accessed October 21, 2015]).
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c Raethel (1988), p. 147, see literature
- ↑ a b c d e f g Madge 2002, p. 393, see literature
- ↑ a b c Madge (2002), p. 394, see literature
- ^ William Gambel, p. 260.
- ^ Edgar Alexander Mearns, p. 113.
- ↑ Herbert Friedmann, p. 371.
- ^ Adriaan Joseph van Rossem, p. 132.
- ^ Edward William Nelson, p. 26.
- ^ Allan Robert Phillips, p. 368.
- ^ Robert Thomas Moore, p. 28.
- ↑ a b c Carroll (1994), p. 424f, see literature
Web links
- Callipepla gambelii in the endangered Red List species the IUCN 2013. Posted by: Butchart, S. & Symes, A. (BirdLife International), 2012. Retrieved on October 11, 2013.