Hi friends.  This week we’re continuing down the list of interesting looking birds I found on an ecotourism website.  Our subject is the bearded bellbird, whose distinguishing feature aside from the male’s namesake beard is that it appears to be photographed most often mid-bellow.  

There are two different subspecies, one occurring only in northeastern Brazil, and the other occurring in Trinidad, Venezuela, Colombia, Guyana, eastern Boliva and northern Brazil.  Like another tropical bird we covered recently, the bearded bellbird is an altitudinal migrant.  It may breed at altitudes of up to 1,900 m (6,200 ft), and spends the rest of the year at lower elevations.  The bellbird has a broad bill with a hooked tip, well suited to snagging and swallowing the berries and other fruit which make up the entirety of its diet.  The bird is an important dispersal agent for seeds throughout its habitat, and unlike many other birds feeds its young regurgitated berries as opposed to caterpillars and insects.  Males occupy a static territory and females chose from among the males in the area.  Mating displays are mainly in the form of vocalization, males will start by calling from high up in the forest canopy and then descend and spread their feathers, showing off their wattle and plumage.  

Nests are a ramshackle affair, and placed on the ends of branches of free-standing trees.  This is most likely to protect the eggs from the many, many rainforest critters who would love to grab one if it were more conveniently located.  The birds are polygamous, and once the egg is laid the female will brood it alone while the male struts off to do more shouting and mate-attracting.  The chicks are abandoned to fend for themselves as soon as they hatch, this is also thought to be an adaptation to the intensely competitive ecosystem the bird occupies.  Bearded bellbirds lay a single egg at a time, so if the nest is discovered and the chick eaten, it is a proportionally small loss compared to a bird that lays a bigger brood.  Not hanging around also makes the nest a less attractive target, and protects the parents so they can live to breed again.  The chick isn’t entirely screwed, though.  Upon hatching it is covered in bristly down, and rolls into a ball when threatened, hiding its most vulnerable bits behind distinctive, pointy feathers that look a lot like a poisonous caterpillar.  

That’s it for me this week, please be good to yourselves and each other. 

Links: https://tinyurl.com/4f98fvhv, https://tinyurl.com/2z7f657e, https://tinyurl.com/5dwzrcz8, https://tinyurl.com/2p9vmdzm, https://tinyurl.com/293m8n88, https://tinyurl.com/49umkvtz