Brown Sicklebill
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| Epimachus meyeri Finsch, 1885 |
The Brown Sicklebill, Epimachus meyeri is a large, up to 96cm long, dark brown and black bird of paradise with highly iridescent plumages, a sickle-shaped bill, pale blue iris and brown underparts. The male is adorned with ornamental plumes on the sides of its breast and a huge sabre-shaped central tail feathers that are highly prized by natives. The female is a reddish brown bird with buff barred black below.
The Brown Sicklebill is distributed to mountain forests of New Guinea, Its appearance resembles the closely related and larger Black Sicklebill. In areas where these two large sicklebills met, the Brown Sicklebill replaced the latter species in higher altitudes. Its diet consists mainly of fruits, arthropods and small animals.
This bird was discovered by Carl Hunstein in 1884 and named after Adolf Bernard Meyer of Dresden Museum, Germany.
The Brown Sicklebill is evaluated as Least Concern on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. It is listed on Appendix II of CITES.
[edit] References
- BirdLife International (2004). Epimachus meyeri. 2006 IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. IUCN 2006. Retrieved on 12 May 2006. Database entry includes justification for why this species is of least concern
