This fancy bird here is a Victoria Crowned Pigeon. And we realize the sight of it is nothing you would expect after reading “a pigeon”. It really is distinct with its bright blue feathers and a beautiful crown on top of its head. It belongs to a Goura family of four unique-looking, ground-dwelling pigeon species. They are also very large as they could reach the size of a turkey!
This particular species is native to the New Guinea region and got its distinct name to commemorate a great historical figure – the British Queen Victoria who ruled the UK in the last decades of the nineteenth century.
These birds are hard to spot roaming wildly as they are the least occurring of all the three crowned pigeon species but are most widely bred in captivity. Deforestation is a great threat to their habitat and therefore, the species is included in the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species as Near Threatened.
The fact that female beauties lay only one egg per mating season is not really helping their survival as well. Furthermore, their mating dance is as intricate as one could expect from such a fancy bird.
As he approaches the female during courtship, the male Victoria Crowned Pigeon Male bows his head in order to show off his best feature – the spectacular crest. And what ritual would it be without a distinct mating song and a good choreography of rhythmically swinging while intensely wagging its tail like the splendid creature he is. Nature sure is a magician!
• Don't insult other visitors. Offensive comments will be deleted without warning.
• Comments are accepted in English only.
• No swearing words in comments, otherwise such comments will be censored.
• Your nickname and avatar are randomly selected. If you don't post comments for 7 days, they both are reset.
• To choose another avatar, click the ‘Random avatar’ link.
