Arabian Bustard
Ardeotis arabs
A large, long-necked bustard with a small crest at the back of the head and white spots on the wing coverts. The sexes have similar plumage, but females are smaller and slimmer. Found in dry savanna, grassland, and desert, usually in pairs or loose groups. Similar to Kori Bustard, but smaller and slimmer, and lacks black at the base of the neck and along the front of the wing. Similar in size to Dehnam’s Bustard, but lacks rufous on the back of the neck. Not very vocal, but will give a low-pitched growling note when displaying or when flushed.
识别特征
As in all bustards, the male Arabian bustard is much larger than the female. Males have been found to weigh 5.7–10.9 kg (13–24 lb), while females weigh 4.5–7.7 kg (9.9–17.0 lb). The record-sized male Arabian bustard weighed 16.8 kg (37 lb). These birds stand from 70 cm (28 in) tall in females to 92 cm (36 in) tall in males. They are fairly similar in overall appearance to the kori bustard, with a brown body, gray neck and white underside, but are noticeably smaller, with a more elegant, slender build. They are also differ in having white checkered covert pattern at the end of the folded wing, as opposed to various black-and-white patterns as seen in other large African bustards.
分类信息
In 1743 the English naturalist George Edwards included an illustration and a description of the Arabian bustard in his A Natural History of Uncommon Birds. Edwards' hand-coloured etching was based on a live specimen that had been kept by Hans Sloan at his house in London. When in 1758 the Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus updated his Systema Naturae for the tenth edition, he placed the Arabian bustard with the other bustards in the genus Otis. Linnaeus included a brief description, coined the binomial name Otis arabs and cited Edwards' work. The specific epithet arabs is Latin meaning "Arabian". The Arabian bustard is now placed in the genus Ardeotis that was introduced in 1853 by the French naturalist Emmanuel Le Maout.<p>Four subspecies are recognised:
- 学名
- Ardeotis arabs
- 命名信息
- (Linnaeus, 1758)
- 目
- Otidiformes
- 科
- Otididae
- 属
- Ardeotis
分布与栖息地
It occupies Semi desert and arid grassy plains, also "Acacia" woodlands. It is found in Algeria, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Chad, Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Guinea-Bissau, Iraq, Kenya, Mali, Mauritania, Morocco, Niger, Nigeria, Saudi Arabia, Senegal, Somalia, Sudan, and Yemen. It is a vagrant to Kenya, Gambia, northern Ivory Coast and northern Ghana.
- 迁徙
- Resident species
行为
The Arabian bustard is usually solitary or lives in pairs and family parties. Small flocks have been observed migrating north into the Sahel zone, to breed during the rainy season before returning south when the dry season begins. However the population in Morocco was considered sedentary, as is the population in the Arabian Peninsula. On these movements the Arabian bustard has been known to migrate with Denham's bustards.<p>The clutch size of Arabian bustards is one to two eggs, laid in a shallow scrape on the ground. The females have sole responsibility for incubation of the eggs and rearing the young. When the brood is threatened, the females has been observed to demonstrate diversionary behaviour, e.g. calling, refusing to flee, to distract potential predators from chicks.<p>Arabian bustards are reported to catch and eat locusts, grasshoppers, beetles, reptiles, and small mammals. They have also been recorded feeding on the seeds and fruits of shrubs, such as Cordia sinensis, Grewia villosa, Salvadora persica and wild melon Citrullus as well as "Acacia" gum.
保护状况
Due to its wide range, it was not considered vulnerable by IUCN, although there is believed to have been a strong decrease in the population. In 2012 the species was uplisted to Near Threatened. The primary cause of the decrease appears to be heavy hunting pressure, with habitat degradation and destruction also playing a major role. The sedentary population recorded from Morocco, the subspecies A.a. lynesi, has not been definitely recorded since 1962, it is likely to be extinct.
- 种群趋势
- declining
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分布
鸟叫声
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