Well, you might disagree with the quote, taken from the video below, but you have to admit that this bird is something speciesl. It’s the tropical royal flycatcher (Onychorhynchus coronatus) that I’ve never seen in my perambulations in the tropical forests of Guatemala, Costa Rica, Peru or Ecuador, though it lives there and, according to Wikipedia, lives “in every mainland South American country except Argentina, Chile, Paraguay, and Uruguay” Here’s its range map from eBird. where you can also hear its squeaky call:
The taxonomy is confusing, with some bird systematists recognizing five subspecies. However, what you want to look at is this amazing crest, which is normally hidden. Again from Wikipedia:
The tropical royal flycatcher is approximately 12.5 to 18 cm (4.9 to 7.1 in) long and weighs 9.7 to 21 g (0.34 to 0.74 oz). It has an erectile fan-shaped crest. In the nominate subspecies O. c. coronatus it is red with blue tips in the male and yellow or orange in the female. The sexes’ plumages are otherwise alike.
The male takes up the first minute of this video; the rest of the video, well worth watching, shows other amazing birds. I have seen the potoo, but it had to be pointed out to me because it looks exactly like a tree branch. (We’ll have a “readers’ wildlife post on the potoo soon.)
Imagine being the first explorer to come across one of these birds!
Not sure I’ve seen this before…
Is there another flycatcher, or am I thinking just of the kingfisher?… maybe it’s something else from RWP …
There was something recently from this site… Can’t recall either.
“Flycatchers” constitute one of the largest groups of birds. There are many hundreds of species in the New World. There is another much smaller not-closely-related group of “flycatchers” in the Old World.
I think that is precisely it – “Old World” – Muscicapidae – I took a look and indeed, no … fascinators…. 😁 Cool!
A bird with a fascinator!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fascinator
Never knew … that explains a few things… when “hat” just doesn’t cut it…
I’m not surprised that our host has not seen a Royal Flycatcher in his travels. They are generally very uncommon and very hard to see in the rain forest, as are almost all birds in such a dense habitat. I have been several times to Latin America, often on dedicated birding trips, and have yet to see this bird. A little over a year ago I was at a site in Ecuador with a birding group and one of the trails there was actually called the Royal Flycatcher trail. Our guide informed us, however, that it had been several years since a Royal Flycatcher had actually been seen on the trail, which was very steep and muddy so, to my chagrin, we didn’t take it. I would have liked to have at least given it a try.
So you would have to be lucky to come across this bird, and very lucky indeed to see it display its crest as, while it readily does so when being handled by humans, it apparently rarely does so when going about its normal business.
As mentioned, the taxonomy isn’t straightforward, with various authorities recognizing one, two, or even four separate species of Royal Flycatcher.
I’ve seen it, but never with crest spread. It is very dull-looking when not excited or terrified.
OMG is all I can say!
Cool birds. Weird AI sounding narrator.