A Pied Kingfisher hovering at Mankwe |Dam in Pilanesburg National Park, Northwest Province, South Africa
The pied kingfisher is a water kingfisher and is found widely distributed across Africa and Asia. Its black and white plumage, crest and the habit of hovering over clear lakes and rivers before diving for fish makes it distinctive. A large-headed, stout-bodied and short-legged bird with a straight, strong, dagger-like, black bill, the pied kingfisher is extremely agile in the air and hovers far more often than other kingfishers. In flight, it holds the body almost vertical, with the head and bill angled sharply downwards, and beats the wings extremely rapidly. When perched, it frequently cocks its tail up and down and raises a crest of feathers on its head (6). The pied kingfisher frequently calls when in flight and when perched, emitting a high-pitched, chattering ‘chick-chick’ and a rattling twitter, with the courtship call being a soft, warbled chirp. A proficient predator of fish, the pied kingfisher forages from a perch or while hovering, flying low over the water before rising up to ten metres, holding a brief hover, and then plunging into the water and seizing its target in its bill. Because of the pied kingfisher’s unrivalled ability to hover, it does not always require extensive woodland around its habitat for perching and can fly as far out as three kilometres from the shoreline while foraging. After it has captured its prey, the pied kingfisher may swallow smaller fish in flight, or carry larger fish cross-wise in the bill back to its perch, before beating its prey to death and swallowing it whole. The pied kingfisher may also eat insects, frogs, tadpoles and molluscs.
Size: 4237px × 2901px
Location: Mankwe Dam in Pilanesburg National Park, Northwest Province, South Africa
Photo credit: © Hein Von Hörsten / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
Keywords: africa, alcedinidae, animalia, aves, bird, catching, ceryle, clear, color, coraciiformes, cordata, dam, daytime, fish, horizontal, hovering, image, kingfisher, mankwe, national, nature, northwest, outdoors, park, pied, pilanesburg, predatar, province, rudis, sky, south, spanned, water, wildlife, wings
