Wood hoopoe

The wood hoopoes are a morphologically distinct group, unlikely to be mistaken for any other.{{Cite book | first = D | last = Ligon | editor-last = Josep | editor-first = del Hoyo | editor2-last = Andrew | editor2-first = Elliott | editor3-last = Sargatal | editor3-first = Jordivdg | contribution = Family Phoeniculidae (Woodhoopoes) | title = Handbook of the Birds of the World. Volume 6, Mousebirds to Hornbills | year = 2001 | pages = [https://archive.org/details/handbookofbirdso0001unse/page/412 412–427] | place = Barcelona | publisher = Lynx Edicions | isbn = 84-87334-30-X }} These species are medium-sized ({{Convert|23|-|46|cm|0|disp=or}} long, much of which is the tail).{{cite book | last = Fry | first = C. Hilary | year = 2003 | chapter = Wood-hoopoes | editor = Perrins, Christopher | editor-link = Chris Perrins | title = The Firefly Encyclopedia of Birds | publisher = Firefly Books | pages = [https://archive.org/details/fireflyencyclope0000unse/page/383 383] | isbn = 1-55297-777-3 | chapter-url-access = registration | chapter-url = https://archive.org/details/fireflyencyclope0000unse/page/383 }} They have metallic plumage, often blue, green or purple, and lack a crest.{{cite book |last = Forshaw |first = Joseph|year=1991|title=Encyclopaedia of Animals: Birds|publisher= Merehurst Press|location=London|pages= 148–149|isbn= 1-85391-186-0}} The sexes are similar in all but two species, the forest wood hoopoe and the common scimitarbill.{{cite book | last1 = Zimmerman | first1 = Dale A. | last2 = Turner | first2 = Donald A. | last3 = Pearson | first3 = David J. | year = 1999 | title = Birds of Kenya and Northern Tanzania | publisher = Princeton University Press | pages = 395 | isbn = 0691010218}} Their bills are either red or black, although young red-billed species also have black bills and bill colour is correlated with age. The legs are scarlet or black, short, with thick tarsi. They climb tree trunks in the manner of a woodpecker, and when feeding on the ground they hop rather than walking like the true hoopoe. Their tails are long and strongly graduated (the central feathers are the longest), and marked conspicuously with white, as are their wings.

File:Common Scimitar-bill 01.jpg ]]

These are birds of open woodland, savannah, or thornbrush, and are mainly arboreal. They require large trees both for feeding on as well as to provide hollows for nesting and nocturnal roosting. Two species are found exclusively in rainforest, the forest wood hoopoe and the white-headed wood hoopoe. All the other species are found in more open woodland and bush.

They feed on arthropods, especially insects, which they find by probing with their bills in rotten wood and in crevices in bark. They nest in unlined tree holes, laying two to four eggs, which are blue, grey, or olive, and unmarked in most species.

Hoopoes hunt for prey primarily on the ground as they use their tongue-like beaks to pick up insects on the soil or grass. The Hoopoe's tongue occupy 2/3 length of the beak.{{Cite journal |last=El-Bakary |first=Neveen |date=2011 |title="Surface Morphology of the Tongue of the Hoopoe (Upupa Epops)" |url=https://www.researchgate.net/publication/215635091 |journal=Journal of American Science |volume=7 |issue=1}}

There are eight species.

Family: Phoeniculidae

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• [https://search.macaulaylibrary.org/catalog?taxonCode=grewoo2&mediaType=v Wood hoopoe videos] on The Cornell Lab of Ornithology - Macaulay Library

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Category:Birds of Sub-Saharan Africa

Category:Taxa named by Charles Lucien Bonaparte