The National Zoo's Dapper Doves
by Howard Youth
One of the most varied and widespread groups of birds, the pigeon and dove family Columbidae consists of 309 species ranging from sparrow-sized ground-doves to turkey-sized crowned pigeons. Pigeons and doves inhabit deserts, savannas, suburbs, and a variety of forest types-but the largest number of species occur in tropical rainforests. In these often-remote, dense habitats, many remain poorly studied, including some of the birds you will find in the National Zoo's Bird House. Like other rainforest denizens, many tropical doves and pigeons are declining, although some, such as the black-naped fruit-dove described below can adapt to regenerating forests and gardens.
At the Bird House, you will find six dove and pigeon species from Southeast Asia. Five of these reside in the Indoor Flight Exhibit. The other, the magnificent ground-pigeon, can be found in its own enclosure nearby.
The huge common crowned pigeon (Goura cristata) haunts the lowland rainforests of western New Guinea, where it is no longer common, but threatened by hunting and logging. This beautiful grayish-blue bird with a frilly crown of feathers feeds on fruits, berries, and invertebrates it finds while walking the forest floor. At nightfall, crowned pigeons heavily flap their way up into the trees to roost.
The magnificent ground-pigeon (Otidiphaps nobilis) is another very large pigeon from New Guinea. This leggy, rusty-backed black bird resembles a pheasant not only in appearance but also in its movements and displays. Scientists still puzzle over its exact relationship to other pigeons. While not endangered, the magnificent ground-pigeon is scarce in its highland rainforest habitat.
The Nicobar pigeon (Caloena nicobarica) looks like a pigeon gone punk: Long feathers drip down its neck and over its breast, while the bird's head resembles a vulture's. Its short, pure-white tail contrasts with its otherwise oily green-colored plumage. The Nicobar pigeon has a curious distribution, nesting in loose colonies mostly on small forested islands from India's Andaman and Nicobar islands east more than 4,000 miles to the Solomon Islands in the Pacific. This island distribution leaves it particularly vulnerable to habitat destruction and hunting.
The yellow-breasted or Sulawesi ground-dove (Gallicolumba tristigmata), a chunky dove found only in the forests of the Indonesian island of Sulawesi, spends its days foraging on the ground for seeds and fruits. You'll have to look carefully in the Indoor Flight Exhibit to admire this secretive bird's beautiful yellow breast and forehead, and its purplish head spot.
The sleek and long-tailed black-billed cuckoo-dove (Macropygia nigrirostris) of New Guinea is easier to see because this cinnamon-colored bird perches higher in the trees. The mostly green black-naped fruit-dove (Ptilinopus melanospila), another arboreal dove, is common in fruiting trees in the southern Philippines, parts of Indonesia, and on a few tiny islands belonging to Malaysia.
Once you step out of the Bird House, keep an eye out for the Zoo's wild columbids. Feral rock doves mooch food from the crane yards and often perch on the building, while mourning doves (Zenaidura macroura) are common throughout the Zoo grounds. And always keep an eye out for the Eurasian collared-dove (Streptopelia decaocto), an exotic soon expected to call the Washington, D.C., area home.
(ZooGoer 276) 1998. Copyright 1998 Friends of the National Zoo. All rights reserved.)
