Australian King Parrot

Australian King Parrot: (Alisterus scapularis) is endemic to eastern Australia. It is found in humid and heavily forested upland regions of the eastern portion of the continent, including eucalyptus wooded areas in and directly adjacent to subtropical and temperate rainforest. They feed on fruits, seeds or small insects. The Australian King Parrot was first described by the German naturalist Martin Lichtenstein in 1818. The species belongs to the genus Alisterus, whose three members are known as king parrots. The genus is sometimes sunk into the genus Aprosmictus.

Adults of both sexes are about 43 cm (17 in) in length, including the long broad tail. The adult male has a red head, breast, and lower undersides, with a blue band on the back of the neck between the red above and green on the back, the wings are green and each has a pale green shoulder band, the tail is green, and the rump is blue. The male has a reddish-orange upper mandible with a black tip, a black lower mandible with an orange base, and yellow irises. The plumage of the female is much different to the male having a green head and breast, a grey beak, and the pale shoulder band is small or absent.

 Australian King Parrot

 Australian King Parrot

 Australian King Parrot

 Australian King Parrot

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Atlantic Puffin

Atlantic Puffin: The Atlantic Puffin (Fratercula arctica) is a seabird species in the auk family. It is a pelagic bird that feeds primarily by diving for fish, but also eats other sea creatures, such as squid and crustaceans. Its most obvious characteristic during the breeding season is its brightly coloured bill. Also known as the Common Puffin, it is the only puffin species which is found in the Atlantic Ocean. The curious appearance of the bird, with its large colourful bill and its striking piebald plumage, has given rise to nicknames such as '"clown of the ocean" and "sea rooster".

The Atlantic Puffin is the provincial bird for the Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador. The Atlantic Puffin is 26-29 centimetres (10-11 in) in length (bill 3-4 cm), with a 47-63 centimetres (19-25 in) wingspan. The male is generally slightly larger than the female, but they are coloured alike. This bird is mainly black above and white below, with grey to white cheeks and red-orange legs. The bill is large and triangular and during the breeding season is bright orange with a patch of blue bordered by yellow at the rear. The characteristic bright orange bill plates grow before the breeding season and are shed after breeding.

 Atlantic Puffin

 Atlantic Puffin

 Atlantic Puffin

Atlantic Puffin

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Emperor Penguin

Emperor Penguin: (Aptenodytes forsteri) is the tallest and heaviest of all living penguin species and is endemic to Antarctica. The male and female are similar in plumage and size, reaching 122 cm (48 in) in height and weighing anywhere from 22 to 45 kg (49 to 99 lb). The dorsal side and head are black and sharply delineated from the white belly, pale-yellow breast and bright-yellow ear patches. Like all penguins it is flightless, with a streamlined body, and wings stiffened and flattened into flippers for a marine habitat.

Its diet consists primarily of fish, but can also include crustaceans, such as krill, and cephalopods, such as squid. In hunting, the species can remain submerged up to 18 minutes, diving to a depth of 535 m (1,755 ft). It has several adaptations to facilitate this, including an unusually structured hemoglobin to allow it to function at low oxygen levels, solid bones to reduce barotrauma, and the ability to reduce its metabolism and shut down non-essential organ functions.

 Emperor Penguin

 Emperor Penguin

 Emperor Penguin

Emperor Penguin

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Albatross

Albatross: Albatrosses, of the biological family Diomedeidae, are large seabirds allied to the procellariids, storm-petrels and diving-petrels in the order Procellariiformes (the tubenoses). They range widely in the Southern Ocean and the North Pacific. They are absent from the North Atlantic, although fossil remains show they once occurred there too and occasional vagrants are found. Albatrosses are among the largest of flying birds, and the great albatrosses (genus Diomedea) have the largest wingspans of any extant birds, reaching up to 12 feet. The albatrosses are usually regarded as falling into four genera, but there is disagreement over the number of species. 

Albatrosses are highly efficient in the air, using dynamic soaring and slope soaring to cover great distances with little exertion. They feed on squid, fish and krill by either scavenging, surface seizing or diving. Albatrosses are colonial, nesting for the most part on remote oceanic islands, often with several species nesting together. Pair bonds between males and females form over several years, with the use of 'ritualised dances', and will last for the life of the pair. A breeding season can take over a year from laying to fledging, with a single egg laid in each breeding attempt.

 Albatross

 Albatross

 Albatross

Albatross

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Macaw

Macaw: Macaws are small to large, long tailed, often colourful New World parrots. Of the many different Psittacidae (true parrots) genera, six are classified as macaws: Ara, Anodorhynchus, Cyanopsitta, Primolius, Orthopsittaca, and Diopsittaca. Previously, the members of the genus Primolius were placed in Propyrrhura, but the former is correct in accordance with ICZN rules. Macaws are native to Mexico, Central America, South America, and formerly the Caribbean. 

Most species are associated with forests, especially rainforests, but others prefer woodland or savannah-like habitats. Large, dark (usually black) beaks, and relatively bare, light coloured, medial (facial patch) areas distinguish macaws. Sometimes the facial patch is smaller in some species, and limited to a yellow patch around the eyes and a second patch near the base of the beak in the members of the genus Anodorhynchus, or Hyacinth Macaw. A macaw's facial feather pattern is as unique as a fingerprint.

 Macaw

 Macaw

 Macaw

 Macaw

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Mallard

Mallard: or Wild Duck (Anas platyrhynchos) is a dabbling duck which breeds throughout the temperate and subtropical Americas, Europe, Asia, and North Africa, and has been introduced to New Zealand and Australia. This duck belongs to the subfamily Anatinae of the waterfowl family Anatidae. The male birds (drakes) have a glossy green head and are grey on wings and belly, while the females have mainly brown-speckled plumage. Mallards live in wetlands, eat water plants and small animals, and are gregarious.

This species is the ancestor of most breeds of domestic ducks. The Mallard was one of the many bird species originally described by Carl Linnaeus in his 18th-century work, Systema Naturae, and still bears its original binomial name. "Mallard" is derived from the Old French malart or mallart "wild drake", although its ultimate derivation is unclear. It may be related to an Old High German masculine proper name Madelhart, clues lying in the alternate English forms "maudelard" or "mawdelard".

 Mallard

 Mallard

 Mallard

Mallard

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Magpie

Magpie: According to analysis, magpies do not form the monophyletic group they are traditionally believed to be a long tail has certainly elongated (or shortened) independently in multiple lineages of corvid birds. Among the traditional magpies, there appear to be two distinct lineages: one consists of Holarctic species with black/white coloration and is probably closely related to crows and Eurasian jays. The other contains several species from South to East Asia with vivid coloration which is predominantly green or blue.

The Azure-winged Magpie is a species with a most peculiar distribution and unclear relationships. It may be the single survivor of a long extinct group of corvid genera. Other research has cast doubt on the taxonomy of the Pica magpies, since it appears that P. hudsonia and P. nuttalli may not be different species, whereas the Korean race of P. pica is genetically very distinct from the other Eurasian (as well as the North American) forms. Either the North American, Korean, and remaining Eurasian forms are accepted as three or four separate species, or there exists only a single species, Pica pica.

 Magpie

 Magpie

 Magpie

Magpie

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Moorhen

Moorhen:  Moorhens, sometimes called marsh hens or river chickens, are medium-sized water birds that are members of the rail family Rallidae. They constitute the genus Gallinula. They are close relatives of coots, and because of their apparently nervous behavior (frequently twitching tail, neck and grinding their backs) are sometimes called "skitty coots". Often, they are referred to as (black) gallinules. A few species from the Australian region, sometimes separated in Tribonyx, are called native-hens. 

Tribonyx is better considered a subgenus however as the differences are not very striking and mainly plesiomorphic. The native-hens differ visually by shorter, thicker and stubbier toes and bills, and longer tails that lack the white signal pattern of typical moorhens. These rails are mostly brown and black with some white markings in plumage colour. Unlike many of the rails they are usually easy to see, feeding in open water margins rather than hidden in reedbeds.

 Moorhen

 Moorhen

 Moorhen

Moorhen

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Nightingale

Nightingale:  The Common Nightingale or simply Nightingale(Luscinia megarhynchos), also known as Rufous Nightingale, is a small passerine bird that was formerly classed as a member of the thrush family Turdidae, but is now more generally considered to be an Old World flycatcher, Muscicapidae. It belongs to a group of more terrestrial species, often called chats.

It is a migratory insectivorous species breeding in forest and scrub in Europe and south-west Asia, but is not found naturally in the Americas. The distribution is more southerly than the very closely related Thrush Nightingale Luscinia luscinia. It nests on the ground within or next to dense bushes. It winters in southern Africa. At least in the Rhineland (Germany), the breeding habitat of nightingales agrees with a number of geographical parameters.

 Nightingale

 Nightingale

 Nightingale

Nightingale

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Ostrich

Ostrich:  The Ostrich, or Common Ostrich (Struthio camelus), is one or two species of large flightless birds native to Africa, the only living member(s) of the genus Struthio that is in the ratite family. Some analyses indicate that the Somali Ostrich may be better considered a full species apart from the Common Ostrich, but most taxonomists consider it to be a subspecies. Ostriches share the order Struthioniformes with the kiwis, emus, rheas, and cassowaries. 

It is distinctive in its appearance, with a long neck and legs and the ability to run at maximum speeds of about 70 km/h (43 mph), the fastest land speed of any bird. The ostrich is the largest living species of bird and lays the largest egg of any living bird (extinct elephant birds of Madagascar and the giant moa of New Zealand did lay larger eggs). The diet of ostriches mainly consists of plant matter, though it also eats invertebrates. It lives in nomadic groups which contain between five and fifty birds.

 Ostrich

 Ostrich

 Ostrich

Ostrich

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Parrot

Parrot:  Parrots, also known as psittacines are birds of the roughly 372 species in 86 genera that make up the order Psittaciformes, found in most tropical and subtropical regions. The order is subdivided into three superfamilies: the Psittacoidea ('true' parrots), the Cacatuoidea (cockatoos) and the Strigopoidea (New Zealand parrots). Parrots have a generally pantropical distribution with several species inhabiting temperate regions in the Southern Hemisphere as well. 

The greatest diversity of parrots is found in South America and Australasia.Characteristic features of parrots include a strong, curved bill, an upright stance, strong legs, and clawed zygodactyl feet. Many parrots are vividly coloured, and some are multi-coloured. The plumage of cockatoos ranges from mostly white to mostly black, with a mobile crest of feathers on the tops of their heads. Most parrots exhibit little or no sexual dimorphism. They form the most variably sized bird order in terms of length.

 Parrot

 Parrot

 Parrot

Parrot

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Peafowl

Peafowl:  Peafowl are three Asiatic species of flying bird in the genus Pavo of the pheasant family, Phasianidae, best known for the male's extravagant eye-spotted tail, which it displays as part of courtship. The male is called a peacock, the female a peahen, and the offspring peachicks. The adult female peafowl is grey and/or brown. Peachicks can be between yellow and a tawny colour with darker brown patches. The term also embraces the Congo Peafowl, which is placed in a separate genus Afropavo.The male (peacock) Indian Peafowl has iridescent blue-green or green colored plumage. 

The peacock tail ("train") is not the tail quill feathers but the highly elongated upper tail covert feathers. The "eyes" are best seen when the peacock fans its tail. Like a cupped hand behind the ear, the erect tail-fan of the male helps direct sound to the ears. Both species have a crest atop the head. The female (peahen) Indian Peafowl has a mixture of dull green, brown, and grey in her plumage. She lacks the long upper tail coverts of the male but has a crest. The female can also display her plumage to ward off female competition or signal danger to her young.

 Peafowl

 Peafowl

 Peafowl

Peafowl

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Pelican

Pelican:  Pelicans are a genus of large water birds comprising the family Pelecanidae. They are characterised by a long beak and large throat pouch used in catching prey and draining water from the scooped up contents before swallowing. They have predominantly pale plumage, the exceptions being the Brown and Peruvian Pelicans. The bills, pouches and bare facial skin of all species become brightly coloured before the breeding season. The eight living pelican species have a patchy global distribution, ranging latitudinally from the tropics to the temperate zone, though they are absent from interior South America as well as from polar regions and the open ocean.

 Fossil evidence of pelicans dates back at least 30 million years, to the remains of a beak very similar to that of modern species recovered from Oligocene strata in France.Long thought to be related to frigatebirds, cormorants, tropicbirds, gannets and boobies, pelicans are now known instead to be most closely related to the Shoebill and Hammerkop, and are placed in the order Pelecaniformes. Ibises, spoonbills and herons are more distant relatives, and have been classified in the same order.

 Pelican

 Pelican

 Pelican

Pelican

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