Swallow-tailed Bee-eater - BirdForum Opus

Subspecies hirundineus
Photo by Mybs
Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park, South Africa (1,200 km's NW of Cape Town), September 2005

Merops hirundineus

Identification

Subspecies chrysolaimus
Photo by d.flack
Gambia, March 2018

23 cm (9 in)

• Green upperparts
• Blue rump
• Black eyestripe with bluish-white lower edge
• Yellow throat with blue lower gorget
• Green breast
• Black beak

Sexes are alike.

Distribution

Sub-Saharan Africa:
Western Africa: found in Senegambia, Senegal, The Gambia, Guinea-Bissau, Mali, Sierra Leone, Ivory Coast, Burkina Faso, Ghana, Togo, Nigeria, Niger, Chad, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, Democratic Republic of Congo, Angola
Eastern Africa: Sudan, South Sudan, Ethiopia, Uganda, Burundi, Tanzania, Zambia, Mozambique, Malawi
Southern Africa: Namibia, Botswana, Zimbabwe, South Africa, KwaZulu-Natal

Taxonomy

Four subspecies are recognised^[1]:

• M. h. chrysolaimus:

• Senegal to southern Chad and north-western Central African Republic

• M. h. heuglini:

• South Sudan and adjacent Ethiopia, Uganda, and Democratic Republic of the Congo

• M. h. furcatus:

• southern Democratic Republic of the Congo to Tanzania, Zambia, southern Zimbabwe, and Mozambique

• M. h. hirundineus:

• Angola and Namibia to Zimbabwe and northern South Africato Angola and Mozambique)

Habitat

Mature savanna woodlands.

Behaviour

Diet

Their diet consists of bees, wasps, hornets, butterflies and grasshoppers which are caught in the air. They feed and roost communally.

Breeding

They nest in sandy banks, or similar flat ground. They make a relatively long tunnel in which the 2 to 4 spherical, white eggs are laid. They nest either alone or with 2 or 3 other pairs in close proximity.

References

1. Clements, J. F., T. S. Schulenberg, M. J. Iliff, D. Roberson, T. A. Fredericks, B. L. Sullivan, and C. L. Wood. 2017. The eBird/Clements checklist of birds of the world: v2017, with updates to August 2017. Downloaded from http://www.birds.cornell.edu/clementschecklist/download/
2. Avibase
3. Handbook of the Birds of the World Alive (retrieved Apr 2018)

• List of references

Recommended Citation

• BirdForum Opus contributors. (2024) Swallow-tailed Bee-eater. In: BirdForum, the forum for wild birds and birding. Retrieved 26 April 2024 from https://www.birdforum.net/opus/Swallow-tailed_Bee-eater

External Links

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