Saddle-billed stork

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Saddle-billed stork
Adult male in Kruger National Park, South Africa
Female in
Masai Mara
, Kenya – irises are yellow

Least Concern  (IUCN 3.1)[1]
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Domain: Eukaryota
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Aves
Order: Ciconiiformes
Family: Ciconiidae
Genus: Ephippiorhynchus
Species:
E. senegalensis
Binomial name
Ephippiorhynchus senegalensis
(Shaw, 1800)
Synonyms[2]

Mycteria senegalensis Shaw, 1800

The saddle-billed stork or saddlebill (Ephippiorhynchus senegalensis) is a large wading bird in the

Côte d'Ivoire and Chad in west Africa.[3] It is considered endangered
in South Africa.

It is a close relative of the widespread Asian and Australian black-necked stork, the only other member of the genus Ephippiorhynchus.

Description

In flight
Head of male showing distinctive iris and yellow wattles, Zambia

This is a huge bird that regularly attains a height of 145 to 150 cm (4 ft 9 in to 4 ft 11 in), a length of 142 cm (4 ft 8 in) and a 2.4 to 2.7 m (7 ft 10 in to 8 ft 10 in) wingspan.

Jabiru stork but possesses a longer, more slender neck and slightly longer legs than the other largest storks, so the saddle-billed is likely to be the tallest extant species of the family.[7] Its extremely long legs measure up to 36.5 cm (14.4 in)) in tarsus length. The long bill measures from 27.3 to 36 cm (10.7 to 14.2 in).[7] The sexes can be readily distinguished by the golden yellow irises of the female and the brown irises and dangling yellow wattles of the male. It is therefore one of the few storks to display sexual dimorphism in colour.[8]

Front view showing red patch on chest, Zambia

It is spectacularly

breeding season.[9]

Behaviour

They are silent except for bill-clattering at the nest. Like most storks, they fly with the neck outstretched, not retracted like a

cryptids
.

Habitat

At the continental scale, saddle-billed storks preferred protected areas that have a higher extent of open water compared to areas without other storks.[3] Some of these trends may, however, be due to a bias in coverage by ornithologists of safer areas such as national parks and protected swamps that afford easier accessibility and comforts.

Breeding

The saddle-billed storks are solitary nesters, building massive nest platforms that are used repeatedly in successive seasons. Unlike many other storks, these species are often seen in pairs in the nonbreeding season suggesting a lifelong pair bond.[10] They breed in forested wetlands and other floodplains in tropical lowlands. It builds a large, deep stick nest in a tree, laying one to five (typically two or three)[11] white eggs weighing about 146 g (5.1 oz) each. The incubation period is 30–35 days, with another 70–100 days before the chicks fledge, with the young often remaining in the parents' territory until the next breeding season.[12]

Food and feeding

Fishing in Botswana
Male trying to swallow a Catfish, Mapungubwe National Park, South Africa

The saddle-billed stork searches for prey by stabbing the bill into the water, catching prey by contact, and in the same way into mud and vegetation.It also hunts by visual detection. In one study with 255 minutes of observation, 71% of successful catches were due to visual foraging, and 29% due to tactile foraging.

slender mongoose (Galerella sanguinea) has been reported.[14]

Relation to Ancient Egyptian culture

This bird is represented in an

Third Dynasty pharaoh Khaba incorporated this hieroglyph in his name (Jiménez Serrano 2002). The first depictions of the species come from depictions during the Late Predynastic Period (pre-3150 B.C.), and trends in depictions have been useful to deduce a decline in the species' range from ancient Egypt likely due to intensifying urbanisation and an increasingly arid climate (c. 2686–2181 BC).[17][18][3]

References

  1. doi:10.2305/IUCN.UK.2016-3.RLTS.T22697706A93631820.en
    . Retrieved 13 November 2021.
  2. ^ Elliott, A.; Garcia, E.F.J. & Boesman, P. (2018). del Hoyo, J.; Elliott, A.; Sargatal, J.; Christie, D.A. & de Juana, E. (eds.). "Saddlebill (Ephippiorhynchus senegalensis)". Handbook of the Birds of the World Alive. Lynx Edicions, Barcelona. Retrieved 24 December 2018.
  3. ^
    doi:10.2989/00306525.2019.1696900
    .
  4. ^ Borrow, N., & Demey, R. (2013). Birds of Senegal and the Gambia. Bloomsbury Publishing.
  5. ^ Womack, D. Dallas Zoo, AZA Saddle-billed Stork SSP Coordinator and Regional Studbook Keeper.
  6. ISBN 978-1-4200-6444-5
    .
  7. ^
    ISBN 978-0-12-322730-0
  8. ^ Elliott, A., E. F. J. Garcia, and P. F. D. Boesman (2020). Saddle-billed Stork (Ephippiorhynchus senegalensis), version 1.0. In Birds of the World (J. del Hoyo, A. Elliott, J. Sargatal, D. A. Christie, and E. de Juana, Editors). Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Ithaca, NY, USA.
  9. ^ "San Diego Zoo file" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2011-07-22. Retrieved 2011-01-13. (477 KB)
  10. ^ Kahl, M. P. "Comparative ethology of the Ciconiidae. Part 6. The black-necked, saddlebill, and jabiru storks (genera Xenorhynchus, Ephippiorhynchus, and Jabiru)." The Condor 75.1 (1973): 17-27.
  11. ^ Womack, Jocelyn. ""Saddle-billed stork species fact sheet"" (PDF). ASAG. Retrieved 9 February 2021.
  12. ^ Bouglouan, Nicole. "Saddle-billed stork". oiseaux-birds.com. Retrieved 25 October 2021.
  13. ^ Gula, Jonah; Mungole, Amukena (2022). "Foraging of Saddle-billed Storks Ephippiorhynchus senegalensis during the dry season in western Zambia" (PDF). SIS Conservation. 4: 10–14.
  14. ^ a b c Gula, J. (2021). Saddle-billed Stork (Ephippiorhynchus senegalensis), version 2.0. In Birds of the World (S. M. Billerman and B. K. Keeney, Editors). Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Ithaca, NY, USA. https://doi.org/10.2173/bow.sabsto1.02
  15. ^ Morris, A. (1979). Saddlebill fishing methods. Honeyguide 98:33.
  16. ISBN 978-1-107-66328-2
    .
  17. JSTOR 41431566
    .
  18. ^ Janák, J. (2014). "Saddle-billed Stork (ba-bird)". UCLA Encyclopedia of Egyptology 1. UCLA. pp. 1–8.

Further reading

External links

Wikispecies has information related to Ephippiorhynchus senegalensis.
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Ephippiorhynchus senegalensis.
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