Cicinnurus respublica

Cladus: Eukaryota
Supergroup: Opisthokonta
Regnum: Animalia
Subregnum: Eumetazoa
Cladus: Bilateria
Cladus: Nephrozoa
Cladus: Deuterostomia
Phylum: Chordata
Subphylum: Vertebrata
Infraphylum: Gnathostomata
Superclassis: Tetrapoda
Classis: Aves
Subclassis: Carinatae
Infraclassis: Neornithes
Parvclassis: Neognathae
Ordo: Passeriformes
Subordo: Passeri
Parvordo: Corvida
Superfamilia: Corvoidea
Familia: Paradisaeidae
Genus: Cicinnurus
Species: Cicinnurus respublica

Name

Cicinnurus respublica (Bonaparte, 1850)

Vernacular names
Internationalization
日本語: アカミノフウチョウ

Reference

Comptes Rendus Hebdomadaire des Séances de l'Académie des Sciences [Paris] 30 p.131,note

The Wilson's Bird-of-paradise, Cicinnurus respublica, is a small, up to 21 cm long, passerine bird of the Paradisaeidae family. The male is a red and black bird-of-paradise with a yellow mantle on its neck, light green mouth, rich blue feet and two curved violet tail feathers. The head is naked blue with black double cross pattern on it. The female is a brownish bird with bare blue crown.

In the field the blue bare skin on the crown of the bird's head is so vivid that it is clearly visible by night, the deep scarlet back and velvet green breast are lush, and the curlicue tail gleams bright silver.

An Indonesian endemic, the Wilson's Bird-of-paradise is distributed to the hill and lowland rainforests of Waigeo and Batanta Islands off West Papua. The diet consists mainly of fruits and small insects.

The controversial scientific name of this species was given by Charles Lucien Bonaparte, Napoleon's nephew and a republican idealist, who described the bird from a badly damaged trade specimen purchased by British ornithologist Edward Wilson. In doing so, he beat John Cassin, who wanted to name the bird in honor of Wilson, by several months. Thirteen years later, in 1863, the German zoologist Heinrich Agathon Bernstein discovered the home grounds of the Wilson's Bird-of-paradise in Waigeo Island.

Due to ongoing habitat loss, limited range and exploitation, the Wilson's Bird-of-paradise is evaluated as Near Threatened on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. It is listed on Appendix II of CITES.

Trivia

The first footage of the Wilson's Bird-of-paradise ever to be filmed was recorded in 1996 by David Attenborough for the BBC documentary Attenborough in Paradise. He did so by dropping leaves on the forest floor, which irrated the bird into clearing them away.

References

BirdLife International (2004). Cicinnurus respublica. 2006. IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. IUCN 2006. www.iucnredlist.org. Retrieved on 11 May 2006. Database entry includes a brief justification of why this species is near threatened.