From Opus

Podiceps major

Photo by arthurgrosset
Location: Taim, Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil

[edit] Identification

L. 78cm. The largest and longest-necked grebe in South America.

• Large
• Dagger-like bill
• Long neck

[edit] Adult breeding

• Blackish-brown with green gloss above
• Browner on wings
• Upper breast and flanks chestnut
• White underparts
• Short tufted crest on nape
• Grey ear coverts, lores, chin, and throat
• Chestnut sides of neck and foreneck
• Black bill
• Blackish-grey legs

[edit] Adult Non-breeding

Similar to adult breeding

• Greyer above
• Duller flanks
• Whiter underparts
• Duller crown
• Whiter cheeks giving a more distinctly capped effect

[edit] Juvenile

Similar to Non-breeding but duller and browner and face and neck with indistinct stripes.

[edit] Flight

• Wings dark above
• Broad white trailing edge to secondaries
• White underwing coverts

Variation: southern birds have darker sides of head

[edit] Distribution

Southern South America from Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil south to Tierra del Fuego and north on the Pacific coast to Coquimba, Chile and again from Pisco north to Piura, Peru. Vagrant to the Falkland Islands. There are two old records from Spain but these are extremely unlikely to involve genuine vagrants. Common in Patagonia.

[edit] Taxonomy

No subspecies usually recognised but southernmost birds are sometimes separated as P. m. navasi.

[edit] Habitat

Lowland lakes and rivers moving to coastal lagoons and estuaries after breeding.

[edit] Behaviour

Especially in southern end of range will winter on the sea, sometimes in congregations

[edit] References

1. Clements, James F. 2007. The Clements Checklist of Birds of the World. 6th ed., with updates to October 2007. Ithaca: Cornell University Press. ISBN 9780801445019
2. Alvaro Jaramillo. 2003. Birds of Chile. Princeton Field Guides. ISBN 0-691-11740-3

[edit] External Links