Prince's Paradise Flycatcher

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Prince's Paradise Flycatcher
Prince's Paradise Flycatcher (Terpsiphone atrocaudata) ♂

Prince's Paradise Flycatcher ( Terpsiphone atrocaudata ) ♂

Systematics
Order : Passerines (Passeriformes)
Subordination : Songbirds (passeri)
Superfamily : Corvoidea
Family : Monarchs (Monarchidae)
Genre : Terpsiphone
Type : Prince's Paradise Flycatcher
Scientific name
Terpsiphone atrocaudata
( Eyton , 1839)

The Prince-Paradiesschnäpper ( Terpsiphone atrocaudata ) or Japanparadiesschnäpper is a species of the genus Paradiesschnäpper from the family of the monarch that of Japan and Korea via Taiwan to the north of the Philippines is widespread.

The IUCN classifies the species as near threatened due to recent population declines .

Appearance and characteristics

Male Prince's Paradise Flycatchers reach a length of 35 to 45 centimeters, while the females are only 17 to 18 centimeters long. This significant difference in length is due to the long, characteristic tail of the male. The weight is 18 to 19 grams . The Prince's Paradise Flycatcher is similar in appearance to the related Asian Paradise Flycatcher , but is smaller than it. The species also has a pronounced sexual dimorphism . The male has a black hood with a purple-bluish sheen. In the chest area the color changes to a blackish gray. The belly is dirty to clear white. The mantle, wings and trunk are purple to maroon brown. The tail is black and the male has greatly elongated central tail feathers that can reach twice the length of the head and torso . The elongated tail feathers are missing in non- adult males.

Illustration from 1838

The female has dark brown back plumage and no elongated tail feathers. The beak is blue, short and wide. The large eyes are outlined in blue.

Habitat and behavior

The Prince's Paradise Flycatcher breed in dense deciduous or mixed forests and plantations on low hills or mountains up to 1000 meters. In central Japan, the birds prefer forested valleys at lower altitudes. In the wintering areas, however, they can be found in different forest habitats , including mangrove forests . During the migration, the birds can also be observed in open forest landscapes, parks and gardens.

An important breeding habitat for the Prince's Paradise Flycatcher is the Gotjawal Forest at the foot of the Hallasan on the South Korean island of Jeju , which is also home to other endangered species such as the Bengal pitta and the red-headed heron.

The Prince's Paradise Flycatcher feeds exclusively on insects. The migration to the northern breeding areas takes place at the end of April, and in September the birds break out again for the wintering areas. The breeding season is between May and July. The approximately 8 centimeter large nest is built in a low fork of a high tree, whereby the lichen Parmotrema tinctorum is preferably used as a building material. It happens that the males shed their long tail feathers in the course of rearing their young.

Distribution area

The Prince's Paradise Flycatcher is common in Japan in the wet forests of southern Honshū , Shikoku and Kyūshū , as well as the Nansei Islands with Okinawa as a breeding bird. However, individual pairs have already been observed during the brood in Iwate Prefecture in the northeast of the Japanese main island of Honshū. The distribution area of the Prince's Paradise Flycatcher extends over the southern and central Korean Peninsula , Taiwan (including the Orchid Island ) and the far north of the Philippines.

The population in Taiwan is mostly sedentary, in all other parts of the distribution area the Prince's Paradise Flycatcher is a migratory bird . The migratory route of the birds runs across parts of mainland China, Hong Kong , northern Thailand , the center and east of Laos , Vietnam, the Philippines, Malaysia and Singapore . The main wintering areas are on the Malay Peninsula , the northern and western Philippines and Sumatra . A sharp decline has been observed in parts of the Japanese breeding populations in recent years, but the birds are still common breeding birds on the Ryūkyū Islands and Batan . In the Russian Primorye region , the Prince's Paradise Flycatcher occasionally appears as a random visitor .

Systematics

There are three subspecies:

  • Terpsiphone atrocaudata atrocaudata ( Eyton , 1839), nominate form, Japan and Korea.
  • Terpsiphone atrocaudata illex Bangs , 1901, somewhat smaller and darker than the nominate form, Ryūkyū Islands.
  • Terspiphone atrocaudata periophthalmica ( Ogilvie-Grant , 1895), purple-black back and gray-black underside, white belly, orchid island and batan.

Endangerment and existence

The populations of the species are probably declining due to deforestation in the wintering areas. The global population of the Prince's Paradise Flycatcher is not known, but national estimates exist which are very imprecise. According to this, there are about 100 to 10,000 breeding pairs in Japan and Korea. In addition there are 50 to 1,000 individuals passing through. There are fewer than 100 breeding pairs in Taiwan, plus 50 to 1,000 migrants. Less than 1,000 migratory birds are sighted annually on the east coast of China.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e BirdLife International 2012. Terpsiphone atrocaudata . In: IUCN 2012. IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Version 2012.2. <www.iucnredlist.org>. Downloaded on June 09, 2013.
  2. ↑ a b c Brazil, Mark: Birds of East Asia , London 2009, p. 302
  3. ↑ a b Fujii, Tadashi & Watanabe, Osamu: Iwate-ken ni okeru sankōchō ( Terpsiphone atrocaudata ) no hanshoku, in: Bulletin of the Iwate Prefectural Museum , no. 29, pp. 9 ～ March 20, 2012 (Japanese)
  4. ^ IOC World Birds List, Ver. 3.3 Online ( Memento from April 5, 2014 in the Internet Archive )

Web links

Commons : Prince's Paradise Flycatcher ( Terpsiphone atrocaudata )  - Collection of images, videos and audio files