Engoulevent d'Europe

Identification

The European nightjar is 24.5–28 cm (9.6–11.0 in) long, with a 52–59 cm (20–23 in) wingspan. The male weighs 51–101 g (1.8–3.6 oz) and the female 67–95 g (2.4–3.4 oz). The adult of the nominate subspecies has greyish-brown upperparts with dark streaking, a pale buff hindneck collar and a white moustachial line. The closed wing is grey with buff spotting, and the underparts are greyish-brown, with brown barring and buff spots. The bill is blackish, the iris is dark brown and the legs and feet are brown.<p>The flight on long pointed wings is noiseless, due to their soft plumage, and very buoyant. Flying birds can be sexed since the male has a white wing patch across three primary feathers and white tips to the two outer tail feathers, whereas females do not show any white in flight. Chicks have downy brown and buff plumage, and the fledged young are similar in appearance to the adult female. Adults moult their body feathers from June onwards after breeding, suspend the process while migrating, and replace the tail and flight feathers on the wintering grounds. Moult is completed between January and March. Immature birds follow a similar moult strategy to the adults unless they are from late broods, in which case the entire moult may take place in Africa.<p>Other nightjar species occur in parts of the breeding and wintering ranges. The red-necked nightjar breeds in Iberia and northwest Africa; it is larger, greyer and longer winged than the European nightjar, and has a broad buff collar and more conspicuous white markings on the wings and tail. Wintering European nightjars in Africa may overlap with the related rufous-cheeked and sombre nightjars. Both have a more prominent buff hind-neck collar and more spotting on the wing coverts. The sombre nightjar is also much darker than its European cousin. Given their nocturnal habits, cryptic plumage and difficulty of observation, nightjar observation "is as much a matter of fortune as effort or knowledge".<p>The male European nightjar's song is a sustained churring trill, given continuously for up to 10 minutes with occasional shifts of speed or pitch. It is delivered from a perch, and the male may move around its territory using different song posts. Singing is more frequent at dawn and dusk than during the night, and is reduced in poor weather. The song may end with a bubbling trill and wing-clapping, perhaps indicating the approach of a female. Migrating or wintering birds sometimes sing. Individual male nightjars can be identified by analysing the rate and length of the pulses in their songs. Even a singing male may be hard to locate; the perched bird is difficult to spot in low light conditions, and the song has a ventriloquial quality as the singer turns his head. The song is easily audible at 200 m (660 ft), and can be heard at 600 m (2,000 ft) in good conditions; it can be confused with the very similar sound of the European mole cricket.<p>The female does not sing, but when on the wing, both sexes give a short cuick, cuick call, also used when chasing predators. Other calls include variations on a sharp chuck when alarmed, hisses given by adults when handled or chicks when disturbed, and an assortment of wuk, wuk, wuk, muffled oak, oak and murmurs given at the nest. Large young have a threat display with the mouth opened wide while hissing loudly.<p>Despite the name, wing-clapping does not involve contact between the two wing tips over the bird's back as was once thought. The sound is produced in a whiplash-like way as each wing cracks down.

Taxonomie

The nightjars, Caprimulgidae, are a large family of mostly nocturnal insect-eating birds. The largest and most widespread genus is Caprimulgus, characterised by stiff bristles around the mouth, long pointed wings, a comb-like middle claw and patterned plumage. The males, and sometimes females, often have white markings in the wing or tail. Within the genus, the European nightjar forms a superspecies with the rufous-cheeked nightjar and the sombre nightjar, African species with similar songs. It is replaced further east in Asia by the jungle nightjar which occupies similar habitat.<p>The European nightjar was described by Carl Linnaeus in his landmark 1758 10th edition of Systema Naturae under its current scientific name. Caprimulgus is derived from the Latin capra, "nanny goat", and mulgere, "to milk", referring to an old myth that nightjars suck milk from goats, and the species name, europaeus is Latin for "European". The common name "nightjar", first recorded in 1630, refers to the nocturnal habits of the bird, the second part of the name deriving from the distinctive churring song. Old or local names refer to the song, "churn owl", habitat, "fern owl", or diet, "dor hawk" and "moth hawk".<p>There are six recognised subspecies, although the differences are mainly clinal; birds become smaller and paler in the east of the range and the males have larger white wing spots. Birds of intermediate appearance occur where the subspecies' ranges overlap.<p>The fossil record is deficient, but it is likely that these poorly defined subspecies diverged as global temperature rose over the last 10,000 years or so. Only one record of the species possibly dates back to the late Eocene.

Nom scientifique

Caprimulgus europaeus

Autorité

Linnaeus, 1758

Ordre

Caprimulgiformes

Famille

Caprimulgidés

Genre

Caprimulgus

Répartition et habitat

The breeding range of the European nightjar comprises Europe north to around latitude 64°N and Asia north to about 60°N and east to Lake Baikal and eastern Mongolia. The southern limits are northwestern Africa, Iraq, Iran and the northwestern Himalayas. This nightjar formerly bred in Syria and Lebanon.<p>All populations are migratory, and most birds winter in Africa south of the Sahara, with just a few records from Pakistan, Morocco and Israel. Migration is mainly at night, singly or in loose groups of up to twenty birds. European breeders cross the Mediterranean and North Africa, whereas eastern populations move through the Middle East and East Africa. Some Asian birds may therefore cross 100° of longitude on their travels. Most birds start their migration at the time of a full moon.<p>Most birds winter in eastern or southeastern Africa, although individuals of the nominate race have been recently discovered wintering in the Democratic Republic of the Congo; records elsewhere in West Africa may be wintering birds of this subspecies or C. e. meridionalis. Most autumn migration takes place from August to September, and the birds return to the breeding grounds by May. Recent tracking data has revealed that European nightjars have a loop migration from Western Europe to sub-equatorial Africa where they have to cross several ecological barriers (the Mediterranean Sea, the Sahara and the Central African Tropical Rainforest). Individuals use similar stop-over sites as do other European migrants. Vagrants have occurred in Iceland, the Faroe Islands, the Seychelles, the Azores, Madeira and the Canary Islands.<p>The European nightjar is a bird of dry, open country with some trees and small bushes, such as heaths, commons, moorland, forest clearings or felled or newly planted woodland. When breeding, it avoids treeless or heavily wooded areas, cities, mountains, and farmland, but it often feeds over wetlands, cultivation or gardens. In winter it uses a wider range of open habitats including acacia steppe, sandy country and highlands. It has been recorded at altitudes of 2,800 m (9,200 ft) on the breeding grounds and 5,000 m (16,000 ft) in the wintering areas.

Aire de reproduction

PAL : w, c

Aire hors reproduction

AF

Migration

Migrateurs complets

Comportement

Mode de migration: Migrateurs complets.

Conservation

Tendance de la population: en déclin.

Tendance de la population

en déclin