17 September 2024: Day 11, WINGS Spain in Autumn. On the plains east of Seville, then our tour concludes at noon in Seville. Click here to see (generally) where I am today. NOTE: This article was written in August.

Today is our last birding day in Spain and I’ve already seen four hoopoes.

Utterly unmistakable orange bird with zebra-striped wings, a Chinese fan of a crest (usually held closed, but often raised just after landing), and a rapier of a bill. Favors semiopen habitats such as heathland, farmland, orchards, grassy lawns, where it feeds on the ground, probing with its long bill for insects

— eBird Species account: Eurasian hoopoe (Upupa epops)

Hoopoes were named for their song …

… and are so eye-catching that humans have both revered and feared them. Hoopoes were sacred in Ancient Egypt and a symbol of virtue in Persia yet harbingers of war in Scandanavia and foreshadowers of death in Estonia. Was it the hoopoe’s behavior that prompted these opinions?

Hoopoes nest in cavities where the female lays 2-12 eggs that hatch 24 hours apart in the order they were laid. The nestlings can therefore range in age from 1 to 12+ days old but the youngest don’t last long.

Early warning: Some gruesome news ahead.

A March report at Science.org describes how researchers in Granada Province observed a gruesome behavior in hoopoe families that is quite unusual among birds.

In the first of two studies, Juan José Soler at the Experimental Station of Arid Zones in Spain showed that “hoopoe mothers frequently feed younger chicks to older chicks. And he suspected that hoopoe mothers laid extra eggs with the intention of using the hatchlings as food.”

The second study bore this out. In settings where food was plentiful during egg laying female hoopoes laid more eggs and later used the youngest chicks as food for the older ones. Interestingly, nests with high cannibalism fledged more chicks that those without.

Beyond the strangeness (dare I say horror?) of cannibalism offered by one’s mother is the fact that hoopoes do not have beaks and claws equipped to kill small birds. “That might be why, says Soler, mother hoopoes often grab the unlucky chick and shove it into the mouth of an older chick, which swallows it whole.” — Science.org.: Watch Out! This colorful bird raises a nest of cannibals.

This behavior may sound familiar to those of you who remember the peregrine mother nicknamed Hope who nested at the Cathedral of Learning in 2016-2019. Every spring Hope killed and ate one or two of her chicks and offered them as food to the older chicks. Now that I know of the hoopoe’s unusual behavior, Hope deserves some extra o’s in her name –> Hoopoe.

Read more about the studies at Science.org: Watch Out! This colorful bird raises a nest of cannibals.

p.s. Despite the strangeness, I still like hoopoes.

16 September 2024: Day 10, Fuente de Piedra, Osuna, and the plains east of Sevilla, WINGS Spain in Autumn Click here to see (generally) where I am today.

One of the target species during our tour’s final days is a very large bird that lives on the steppes and grasslands of Spain. The great bustard (Otis tarda) is the most sexually dimorphic of all birds in terms of size. The males can weigh as much as 42 pounds, are the second heaviest flying bird on earth(*), and average 2.48 times the weight of females. They also stand 3+ feet tall so if one’s out there in the grass we should be able to see it.

Unfortunately the colorful range map below is a bit misleading. The great bustard (Otis tarda) is Endangered and in low numbers everywhere except Spain. According to Wikipedia, “More than half the global population is found in central Spain with around 30,000 individuals.” Some locations in Europe have as few as 100 to 1,000 birds.

Great bustards are famous for their courtship displays. In March the males gather on a lek to joust and puff their feathers.

Females are attracted by features of the display that we humans cannot hear or see. For instance, bustards make low frequency sounds that carry a long distance in open country. Perhaps she hears him from far away.

Bustards’ ability to see UV light plays a part in their courtship. The males’ reddish/brownish feathers contain a pigment called porphyrin, chemically related to hemoglobin, that shows intense red fluorescence under ultraviolet light, as seen in an experiment below.

When a male great bustard fluffs his throat feathers the females see bright glowing magenta in UV light.

Porphyrin pigment breaks down during exposure to sunlight so this feature is lost in older feathers as male breeding plumage ages. By the time the glow is gone, the males don’t need it. Courtship is over until next year.

(*) p.s. The heaviest bird capable of flight is the Kori bustard.