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Drepanoptila holosericea
This medium sized (28 -30cm) dove is generally a bright green over the head, neck, upper breast, back, wings and tail. The wings and tail have silvery white bars on them. The belly to the vent is bright lemon yellow and there is a black stripe running across the lower breast with a white pin stripe above that. The legs have white feathers covering them down to red feet and they also have a small white throat patch running down into the upper breast.
Endemic to New Caledonia, and found on the islands of Grande Terre and Iles des Pins. This adult bird was seen in reserve area a few kms out of Noumea. Found in humid forest in hill country in the canopy. I heard these birds far more often than I saw them and even then views were usually obscured by thick foliage.
The name comes from the notched wing feathers that give this bird a very distinctive sound when it flies. Not that uncommon, it is classed as near threatened and is hunted for food by the local people and the general trend seems to be the population in slow decline. Ref: HBW Live.
Spotted on Aug 19, 2018
Submitted on Oct 26, 2018
23 Comments
A very belated congrats for your SOTD Rob! With shots like these, please keep on tramping. Thank you for sharing :)
Thank you Rach and Ali for your comments.
very beautiful
A belated congratulations for another worthy SOTD!
Thank you Greg, Gilma, and ForestDragon for your kind and supportive comments for this spotting.
This is one of the most interestingly colored doves I have seen! Thank you so much for sharing this beauty.
OMG! That is amazing..thank you for sharing
Congratulations on SOTD...such a wonderfully beautiful bird.
Robert, you're welcome! It's a truly splendid bird. Have you considered creating a mission for New Caledonia?
Soy,
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Thank you so much for the honour of sotd for this species. It was a pleasure to showcase it here. Thank you also Sunny for your comment. I hope you figured it out Soy.
Hi do yoy know how can I download the app for android?
Congrats to you triggsturner..
Congratulations Robert, these beautiful shots of a unique bird have earned you a Spotting of the Day:
"Magnificent in green, this Cloven-feathered Dove (Drepanoptila holosericea) is our Spotting of the Day! Endemic to New Caledonia, the Cloven-feathered Dove is a close relative of the colorful fruit doves (genus Ptilinopus) found in the forests of Southeast Asia and Oceania. This dove seems to feed exclusively on small fruits and berries. Classified as Near-threatened by the IUCN, its small populations are affected by hunting, deforestation and mining. New Caledonia is part of a fragment of the ancient super-continent known as Gondwanna which broke away over 60 million years ago. A great part of its taxa are unique, especially birds and plants. The main island of Grande Terre's central mountain range provides diverse niches and micro-climates allowing endemic species to thrive".
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Thanks Jim. I shall keep up the training ;)
Keep tramping with that camera...another great spotting!
Thank you Lauren, Zlatan, Rach and Dr Namgyal for you comments and support of this spotting. Dr I am not sure if the marker is exactly on the spot I saw this bird as we hiked over several ridges in the forest, but I know it is within this general area. I do a lot of hiking (in NZ and Australia we call it tramping) and have carried my camera for many kms. I sometimes wish it was a little lighter in weight than it is! :)
I checked your GoogleMap and saw that you done quite a walk into the woods, after the drive! Bravo!
Fantastic photos - and the dove is a masterpiece in shades of green!
wow! those colours. Great find!
Amazing, a green dove! Beautiful pictures!
Thank you Felix. I agree, as you can see from the colours, its next to impossible to see when its sitting in the tree canopy. I just got lucky with this guy.
Great find! What an awesome bird.