Yungas guan facts for kids
Quick facts for kids Yungas guan |
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Penelope
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bridgesi
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The Yungas guan (say "YOON-gas gwahn") is a type of bird that lives in the Andes mountains. It belongs to a bird family called Cracidae, which includes birds like chachalacas, guans, and curassows. You can find this bird in the lower parts of the Andes in Argentina and Bolivia.
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What is the Yungas Guan?
For a long time, people thought the Yungas guan was just a type of another bird called the dusky-legged guan. But in 2018, scientists found many differences in how they look. Earlier, they also noticed that these two birds made very different sounds.
Because of these differences, bird experts decided the Yungas guan was special enough to be its own species. This change happened in late 2020 and early 2021.
What Does the Yungas Guan Look Like?
Both male and female Yungas guans look very similar. Their upper feathers are a chestnut color, and their lower feathers are a dull reddish-brown. Their belly has brown or orange stripes, and their tail is dark brown.
The head and the back of their neck are black. The feathers on their neck, back, and chest have white edges. These white edges are much bigger than those on the dusky-legged guan. The skin on their face is a gray color, and they have a red wattle (a fleshy growth) under their chin.
The Yungas guan is also bigger than the dusky-legged guan. Yungas guans can be about 77 to 89 centimeters (about 30 to 35 inches) long. The dusky-legged guan is smaller, usually 48 to 66 centimeters (about 19 to 26 inches) long.
Where Does the Yungas Guan Live?
The Yungas guan lives on the eastern side of the Andes mountains. You can find it in the Southern Andean Yungas region, which is in southwestern Bolivia and northwestern Argentina.
This bird likes to live in subtropical evergreen forests. These are forests that stay green all year round and are found in warmer areas. It lives at elevations from below 1,000 meters (about 3,300 feet) up to about 1,900 meters (about 6,200 feet).
What Does the Yungas Guan Do?
The Yungas guan mostly eats fruit and leaves. The types of fruits and leaves it eats can change depending on where it lives.
Even though these birds usually stay in one area, scientists think they might move to different elevations during different seasons. This means they might move higher or lower on the mountains depending on the time of year. The main time for them to have their babies is between October and December.
Protecting the Yungas Guan
There might be as many as 100,000 Yungas guans in the wild. However, in Argentina, this bird is considered vulnerable. This is because people often hunt it for food and for sport.
The IUCN (International Union for Conservation of Nature), which helps track how safe animal species are, has not yet officially checked on the Yungas guan.
See also
In Spanish: Pava de Bridge para niños
