Black stork

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Ciconia nigra
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This article is about the bird. For the 1917 film, see
Special Services Group
.

Black stork
In Kruger National Park, South Africa

Least Concern  (IUCN 3.1)[1]
CITES Appendix II (CITES)[2]
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Domain: Eukaryota
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Aves
Order: Ciconiiformes
Family: Ciconiidae
Genus: Ciconia
Species:
C. nigra
Binomial name
Ciconia nigra
Range of C. nigra
  Breeding
  Resident
  Passage
  Non-breeding
Synonyms

Ardea nigra Linnaeus, 1758

The black stork (Ciconia nigra) is a large bird in the

Palearctic to the Pacific Ocean. It is a long-distance migrant, with European populations wintering in tropical Sub-Saharan Africa, and Asian populations in the Indian subcontinent. When migrating between Europe and Africa, it avoids crossing broad expanses of the Mediterranean Sea and detours via the Levant in the east, the Strait of Sicily in the center, or the Strait of Gibraltar
in the west. An isolated, non-migratory, population occurs in Southern Africa.

Unlike the closely related

fledging
takes 60 to 71 days.

The black stork is considered to be a

Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora. On May 31, 1968, South Korea designated the species as natural monument 200.[3]

Taxonomy and etymology

English naturalist

zoologist Mathurin Jacques Brisson two years later.[8] The word stork is derived from the Old English word storc, thought to be related to the Old High German storah, meaning "stork", and the Old English stearc, meaning "stiff".[9]

From Manas Tiger Reserve, Assam, India.

The black stork is a member of the genus Ciconia, or typical storks, a group of seven

extant species, characterised by straight bills and mainly black and white plumage.[10] The black stork was long thought to be most closely related to the white stork (C. ciconia).[11] However, genetic analysis via DNA–DNA hybridization and mitochondrial cytochrome b DNA by Beth Slikas in 1997 found that it was basal (an early offshoot) in the genus Ciconia.[12][13] Fossil remains have been recovered from Miocene beds on Rusinga and Maboko Islands in Kenya, which are indistinguishable from the white and black storks.[14]

Description

Adult in a Dutch zoo

The black stork is a large bird, measuring between 95 and 100 cm (37 and 39 in) in length with a 145-to-155 cm (57-to-61 in) wingspan,[15] and weighing around 3 kg (6.6 lb).[16] Standing as tall as 102 cm (40 in),[17] it has long red legs, a long neck and a long, straight, pointed red beak.[15] It bears some resemblance to Abdim's stork (C. abdimii), which can be distinguished by its much smaller build, predominantly green bill, legs and feet, and white rump and lower back.[15][18] The plumage is black with a purplish green sheen, except for the white lower breast, belly, armpits, axillaries and undertail coverts.[15][19] The breast feathers are long and shaggy, forming a ruff which is used in some courtship displays.[15] The black stork has brown irises, and bare red skin around its eyes.[15][20] The sexes are identical in appearance, except that males are larger than females on average.[15] Moulting takes place in spring, with the iridescent sheen brighter in new plumage.[21] It walks slowly and steadily on the ground and like all storks, it flies with its neck outstretched.[22]

The juvenile resembles the adult in plumage, but the areas corresponding to the adult black feathers are browner and less glossy. The scapulars, wing and upper tail coverts have pale tips. The legs, bill and bare skin around the eyes are greyish green.[15] It could possibly be confused with the juvenile yellow-billed stork, but the latter has paler wings and mantle, a longer bill and white under the wings.[23]

Distribution and habitat

Black stork in flight

During the summer, the black stork is found from Eastern Asia (Siberia and northern China) west to Central Europe, reaching Estonia in the north, Poland, Lower Saxony and Bavaria in Germany, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Italy and Greece in the south,[15] with an outlying population in the central-southwest region of the Iberian Peninsula (Extremadura and surrounding provinces of Spain, plus Portugal).[24] It is migratory, wintering in tropical Africa and Asia, although certain populations of black storks are sedentary or dispersive.[21] An isolated population exists in Southern Africa, where the species is more numerous in the east, in eastern South Africa and Mozambique, and is also found in Zimbabwe, Eswatini, Botswana and less commonly Namibia.[25]

Most of the black storks that summer in Europe migrate to Africa,

western Asia migrate to northern and northeastern India,[21] ranging mainly from Punjab south to Karnataka,[27] and Africa.[20] They are occasional visitors to Sri Lanka.[28] Those summering further east in eastern Russia and China winter mainly in southern China, and occasionally in Hong Kong, Myanmar, northern Thailand, and Laos.[21] They were first recorded in western Myanmar in 1998.[29]

The black stork prefers more wooded areas than the better-known white stork, and breeds in large marshy

creeks.[15] It usually inhabits ponds, rivers, edges of lakes, estuaries and other freshwater wetlands.[20] The black stork does inhabit more agricultural areas in the Caspian lowlands, but even here it avoids close contact with people.[15] Its wintering habitat in India comprises reservoirs or rivers with nearby scrub or forest, which provide trees that black storks can roost in at night.[27] In southern Africa it is found in shallow water in rivers or lakes, or swamps, but is occasionally encountered on dry land.[25]

After disappearing from Belgium before the onset of the 20th century, it has returned to breed in the

Korean Peninsula, the black stork is an uncommon summer visitor, no longer breeding in the south since 1966. Birds have been seen in the northeast but it is not known whether they breed there. Similarly it has been seen in the summer in Afghanistan, but its breeding status is uncertain.[21]

Migration

Red line: Migration border
Orange arrow: Western migration
Yellow arrow: Eastern migration
Blue: Winter location

Migration takes place from early August to October, with a major exodus in September.

Cap Bon (Tunisia), crossing the Strait of Sicily.[37][39]

Spain contains several important areas—Monfragüe National Park, Sierra de Gredos Regional Park, National Hunting Reserve in Cíjara, Natural Park of the Sierra Hornachuelos and Doñana National Park—where black storks stop over on the western migration route. Pesticide use has threatened birdlife in nearby Doñana. Further south, Lake Faguibine in Mali is another stopover point but it has been affected by drought in recent years.[40]

Behaviour

A wary species, the black stork avoids contact with people.[20] It is generally found alone or in pairs, or in flocks of up to 100 birds when migrating[41] or during winter.[20]

The black stork has a wider range of calls than the white stork, its main call being a chee leee, which sounds like a loud inhalation. It makes a hissing call as a warning or threat.[42] Displaying males produce a long series of wheezy raptor-like squealing calls rising in volume and then falling.[43] It rarely indulges in mutual bill-clattering when adults meet at the nest.[44] Adults will do so as part of their mating ritual or when angered. The young clatter their bills when aroused.[42]

The up-down display is used for a number of interactions with other members of the species. Here a stork positions its body horizontally and quickly bobs its head up from down-facing to around 30 degrees above horizontal and back again, while displaying the white segments of its plumage prominently, and this is repeated several times. The display is used as a greeting between birds, and—more vigorously—as a

threat display. The species' solitary nature means that this threat display is rarely witnessed.[41]

Breeding

pair with eggs in nest; Salto Del Gitano, Cáceres, Spain
Ringed black stork foraging in a ditch in the Netherlands
Black stork foraging

The black stork breeds between April and May in the Northern Hemisphere,[21] with eggs usually laid in late April.[45] In southern Africa, breeding takes place in the months between September and March, possibly to take advantage of abundant water prey rendered easier to catch as the rivers dry up and recede—from April and May in Zimbabwe, Botswana and northern South Africa, and as late as July further south.[25]

Pairs in courtship have aerial displays that appear to be unique among the storks. Paired birds soared in parallel, usually over the nest territory early in the mornings or late afternoons with one bird splaying the white undertail coverts to the sides of the narrowed black tail and the pair calls to each other. These courtship flights are difficult to see due to the densely forested habitat in which they breed.[46] The nest is large, constructed from sticks and twigs, and sometimes also large branches, at an elevation of 4–25 m (13–82 ft).[1][21] The black stork prefers to construct its nest in forest trees with large canopies where the nest can be built far from the main trunk—generally in places far from human disturbance.[1][21] For the most part, deciduous trees are chosen for nesting sites, though conifers are used as well.[15] A 2003 field study in Estonia found that the black stork preferred oak (Quercus robur), European aspen (Populus tremula), and to a lesser extent Scots pine (Pinus sylvestris), and ignored Norway spruce (Picea abies), in part due to the canopy structure of the trees. Trees with nests averaged around 25.6 ± 5.2 metres (84 ± 17 ft) high and had a diameter at breast height of 66 ± 20 centimetres (26.0 ± 7.9 in). Furthermore, 90% of the trees chosen were at least 80 years old, highlighting the importance of conserving old-growth forests.[47] A 2004 field study of nesting sites in Dadia-Lefkimi-Soufli National Park in north-eastern Greece found that it preferred the Calabrian pine (Pinus brutia), which had large side branches that allowed it to build the nest away from the trunk, as well as black pine (Pinus nigra) and to a lesser extent Turkey oak (Quercus cerris). It chose the largest trees in an area, generally on steeper ground and near streams. Trees chosen were on average over 90 years old.[48] In the Iberian peninsula it nests in pine and cork oak (Quercus suber).[24]

In steeply mountainous areas such as parts of Spain, South Africa and the

Fledging takes 60 to 71 days, after which the young joins the adults at their feeding grounds.[21] However, for another two weeks, the young continue to return to the nest, to be fed and to roost at night.[21]

At least one adult remains in the nest for two to three weeks after hatching to protect the young. Both parents feed the young by regurgitating onto the floor of the nest.[21] Black stork parents have been known to kill one of their fledglings, generally the weakest, in times of food shortage to reduce brood size and hence increase the chance of survival of the remaining nestlings. Stork nestlings do not attack each other, and their parents' method of feeding them (disgorging large amounts of food at once) means that stronger siblings cannot outcompete weaker ones for food directly, hence parental infanticide is an efficient way of reducing brood size. This behaviour has only rarely been observed in the species, although the shyness of the species and difficulties in studying its nesting habits mean that it might not be an uncommon phenomenon.[50]

Ringing recovery studies in Europe suggests that nearly 20% of chicks reach the breeding stage, around 3 years, and about 10% live beyond 10 years and about 5% beyond 20 years. Captive individuals have lived for as long as 36 years.[51]

Feeding

The black stork mainly eats fish,[1] including small cyprinids, pikes, roaches, eels, budds, perches, burbots, sticklebacks and muddy loaches (Misgurnus and Cobitis).[52] It may feed on amphibians, small reptiles, crabs, mammals and birds, and invertebrates such as snails,[1] molluscs,[45][52] earthworms, and insects like water beetles and their larvae.[52][45]

Foraging for food takes place mostly in fresh water, though the black stork may look for food on dry land at times.[21] The black stork wades patiently and slowly in shallow water, often alone or in a small group if food is plentiful. It has been observed shading the water with its wings while hunting.[41] In India, it often forages in mixed species flocks with the white stork, woolly-necked stork (Ciconia episcopus), demoiselle crane (Grus virgo) and bar-headed goose (Anser indicus). The black stork also follows large mammals such as deer and livestock, presumably to eat the invertebrates and small animals flushed by their presence.[27]

Parasites and symbionts

More than 12 species of parasitic

mesostigmatid mites—particularly the genera Dendrolaelaps and Macrocheles—have been recovered from black stork nests. Their role is unknown, though they could prey on parasitic arthropods.[58]

Status and conservation

Since 1998, the black stork has been rated as a species of 

Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES).[1]

Hunters threaten the black stork in some countries of southern Europe and Asia,

Ticino River valley in northern Italy, with hunting a likely contributor. In 2005, black storks were released into the Parco Lombardo del Ticino in an attempt to re-establish the species there.[30]

Since October 2021, the black stork has been classified as Moderately Depleted by the

IUCN.[61]

Notes

  1. ^ The universally accepted starting point of modern taxonomy for animals is set at 1758, with the publishing of Linnaeus' 10th edition of Systema Naturae, although scientists had been coining names in the previous century.[5]

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Cited texts

External links

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