Black curassow facts for kids
Quick facts for kids Black curassow |
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Crax
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alector
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The black curassow (Crax alector) is a large, dark bird. It is also known as the smooth-billed curassow or crested curassow. This bird belongs to the Cracidae family. This family includes chachalacas, guans, and other curassows.
You can find black curassows in humid forests. They live in northern South America. This includes Colombia, Venezuela, and the Guianas (like Suriname). They are also found in northern Brazil. Sometimes, they have been brought to islands like the Bahamas, Cuba, and Puerto Rico.
Black curassows are special because males and females look very similar. Both are mostly black. They have a white area around their tail (called a crissum). They also have a yellow or orange-red patch near their beak. This patch is called a cere.
Contents
Types of Black Curassows
There are two main types, or subspecies, of the black curassow. These types have slight differences in where they live.
- C. a. alector was first described by Carl Linnaeus in 1766. This type lives in eastern Colombia and Venezuela. You can find them south of the Orinoco River.
- C. a. erythrognatha was described later in 1877. This type lives in eastern Venezuela. It also lives in the Guianas and northern Brazil. You can find them north of the Amazon River.
What They Look Like
The black curassow is a big bird. It can grow to be about 35 inches (900 mm) long.
Male curassows have shiny black feathers on their upper body. These feathers can look purplish in the light. They also have a black crest on their head. The skin at the base of their grey beak is yellow or orange. Their lower body is white.
Female curassows look very similar to males. However, their crest has white stripes. Young curassows are black. They have reddish-brown and reddish-buff patterns.
How They Live
Black curassows spend most of their time on the ground. They live in the thick plants of lowland forests. You can also find them in plantations and near rivers.
They mostly eat fruit. But they also enjoy other foods. These include buds, shoots, leaves, and flowers. They might also eat fungi and small invertebrates (like insects).
When it's time to nest, they build a platform of sticks. Their nests are usually a few meters high in trees. In Suriname, they lay eggs during the rainy season. In French Guiana, young birds have been seen in March and September.
Their Conservation Status
Even though black curassows are fairly common, their numbers are going down. This is happening for a few reasons. Their habitat (where they live) is shrinking. People also trap and hunt them.
These problems are likely to continue. However, the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) checks on animals. They have listed the black curassow as a "least concern" species. This means they are not in immediate danger of disappearing.
See also
In Spanish: Paujil culiblanco para niños
