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African hoopoe
Upupa africana
-4.89394, 11.9531
Field Notes
Description:
Unmistakable and striking pigeon-sized bird. Black and white striped broad and rounded wings; buff chest, neck and back. It shows a long, narrow and scimitar-like curved bill, and a distinctive buffy-pink crest with black tips. This crest is usually kept folded, except briefly when landing, otherwise is unfolded rarely. Tail is broad, black with a white band.
African Hoopoe was (or still is) considered as a race of eurasian hoopoe; but its buff parts are richer and darker cinnamon; and there is more dark yellow on the back (see photo 2). Here are my two spottings of Eurasian hoopoe for comparison: http://www.projectnoah.org/spottings/1810946002 (from Croatia) and http://www.projectnoah.org/spottings/1978125396 (from Sudan).
Moreover, there are some more differences in upper wings colorings as well; but these are not visible in these photos.
Habitat:
Here, we observed on several occasions during our stay in this eco-lodge Malonda, near Pointe Noire. Lodge itself is on the Atlantic coast; overlooking the sandy beach and shallow but large lagoon. It is also bordering edges of tropical forest.
According to my favorite birdwatching guide "Birds of Africa south of Sahara" by Sinclair & Ryan; African hoopoe is distributed south of Equator; while the eurasian hoopoe is mainly found north of it, in Sahel belt.
Notes:
The discussion about this species and its taxonomic place is still ongoing... In most cases, today, African Hoopoe is recognized as separate species; on some websites and books, is still classified as Upupa epops africana... Moreover, most often it is classified in order Bucerotiformes, with hornbills; while in the newest classification based on DNA, a separate order, Upupiformes, was created. This order includes hoopoes (fam Upupidae), wood-hoopoes (fam Phoeniculidae ) and Scimitar-bills (fam Rhinopomastidae).
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