Iphis flycatcher
| Iphis flycatcher | ||||||||||||
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| Systematics | ||||||||||||
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| Scientific name | ||||||||||||
| Pomarea iphis | ||||||||||||
| Murphy & Mathews , 1928 |
The Iphis flycatcher ( Pomarea iphis ) is a songbird belonging to the monarch family . It is endemic to the island of Ua Huka in the Marquesas .
features
The Iphis flycatcher reaches a size of 17 centimeters. The wing length is 90 to 96 millimeters, the tail length 72 to 81 millimeters, the beak ridge measures 17 millimeters, the beak length from the nostril 11 to 11.8 millimeters, and the barrel is 27 to 28 millimeters long. In the adult male, the head, back, rump, upper tail-coverts and breast are black with a greenish tinge. The plumage is dark. The arm swing and especially the control springs have a dark green sheen. The elytra are black with a narrow shiny edge. The underbust, the belly and the flanks are covered with mixed white and matt black feathers, which give the plumage a coarse speckled appearance. The iris is brown, the bill black with a bluish tint near the base. The legs and feet are soot black. In the adult female, the skull and neck are olive brown with a few feathers interspersed on the forehead, crown and around the eye. The back, shoulder pads, rump, and upper tail pads are cinnamon brown. The feathers are olive brown with narrow yellow-brown outer edges. The control springs have whitish inner edges and the arm wings have whitish inner and end edges. The wing covers are olive brown with broad, yellowish brown edges and tips. The belly is whitish. The cheeks and throat are streaked black. The flanks, the chest and the under tail-coverts are yellow-brown. The under wing-coverts are whitish. The young birds are similar to the females, but they lack hair on the head and throat.
Habitat and way of life
On the island of Ua Huka, which is still 30% forested today, the breeding birds usually stay at altitudes between 30 and 650 m above sea level. Non-breeding birds can be found up to an altitude of 840 m. The preferred habitat of the Iphis flycatcher are rainforests in the south of the island and lowland dry forests (with Pisonia grandis ) on the east coast. He searches for food in the thick bushes, picks up insects from the branches or hunts them in dark, shady areas under the canopy of thick bushes. The nest is built in tall trees at a height between three and fifteen meters. The clutch usually consists of two eggs.
status
In 1975 the population was reduced to a few hundred pairs due to a plague of rats. Today Ua Huka is rat-free and the population was stable in 1998 at around 1250 pairs. The IUCN lists the species as "endangered" ( vulnerable ).
Individual evidence
- ↑ MANU, Oiseaux de Polynésie - Au vent des îles éditions ( Memento of the original of September 28, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ Birds collected during the Whitney South Sea Expedition (PDF; 1.9 MB)
- ↑ Birdlife factsheet Iphis Monarch
- ↑ MANU, Oiseaux de Polynésie - Au vent des îles éditions ( Memento of the original of September 28, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
Web links
- Birds collected during the Whitney South Sea Expedition (PDF file; 1.78 MB)
- Pomarea Iphis in the endangered Red List species the IUCN 2008. Posted by: BirdLife International, 2006. Retrieved on January 25 of 2009.