The Spoonbill family of birds has six members but the Blacked-faced Spoonbill is the only one that is classified as an “Endangered” species by BirdLife International.
Because it has a very restricted distribution in coastal areas of East Asia and only breeds in some islands in North Korea, the world population of the Black-faced Spoonbill is just over 1000. So it is a very precious bird.
Luckily for us, these birds choose to winter in Hong Kong every year and sometimes we can see up to 50% of the world’s population in one winter.
The Black-faced Spoonbills feed in a very unique way. They often look for aquatic animals such as fish and shrimps in shallow water.
The Black-faced Spoonbills feed in a very unique way. They often look for aquatic animals such as fish and shrimps in shallow water.
When feeding, they swing the large spoon-like bill from side to side while moving forward to look for prey.
Once the hunt is successful, they then lift the bill up to swallow the catch.
Most of the time they hunt from night till morning and rest during day time. The resting posture looks very interesting.
According to Hong Kong Bird Watching Society’s (HKBWS) report, a total of 1,848 Black-faced Spoonbills were recorded in the world in January this year. HKBWS has dedicated a web page for this bird. http://www.hkbws.org.hk/archive/bfs/index.html
3 comments:
Piękne zdjęcia ptaków w ich naturalnym środowisku. Zawsze podziwiałam ich dzioby, jak "łopatki"
:-). Pozdrawiam
Adoro estes pássaros, e esta seção de fotos está muito bonita.
Um abraço.
Evolution gives even the spoons in the mouth, good pictures.
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