Andean cock-of-the-rock

Andean cock-of-the-rock

Andean cock-of-the-rock (Rupicola peruvianus) is an iconic bird found in the subtropical and cloud forests of the Andes spanning a wide range across South America from Venezuela to Bolivia. The male cock-of-the-rock stands out with its brilliant red-orange plumage, black-and-white wings, and a large fan-like crest, with its bill sitting under the crest and completely hidden. Known as tunki in Quechua, the region’s indigenous language, this bird is considered the national bird of Peru and is related to other distinctive tropical fruit-eaters such as the Banded Cotinga, Long-wattled Umbrellabird and Bearded Bellbird....

January 25, 2023 · 5 min · Santhosh Krishnamoorthy
Hummingbird and rain

Hummingbirds and the rain

Hummingbirds are a highly diverse, brilliantly coloured and mesmerizing group of birds native to the Americas. There are known to be around 360 different species of hummingbirds across the North and South Americas, however, the density of these birds is quite high in the tropics around the equator. They are known as hummingbirds owing to the humming sound created by their beating wings which flap at high frequencies. They hover in mid-air at rapid wing-flapping rates, which vary from around 12 beats per second in the largest species to around 80 per second in small hummingbirds....

January 13, 2023 · 4 min · Santhosh Krishnamoorthy