The golden-fronted bowerbird (''Amblyornis flavifrons'') is a medium-sized, approximately 24 cm long, brown

bowerbird Bowerbirds () make up the bird family Ptilonorhynchidae. They are renowned for their unique courtship behaviour, where males build a structure and decorate it with sticks and brightly coloured objects in an attempt to attract a mate. The family ...

that is endemic to the

Foja Mountains The Foja Mountains (Foja Range, Foya Mountains) () are located just north of the Mamberamo river basin in Papua, Indonesia. The mountains rise to , and have 3,000 square kilometers of old growth tropical rainforest in the interior part of the r ...

New Guinea New Guinea (; Hiri Motu: ''Niu Gini''; , fossilized , also known as Papua or historically ) is the List of islands by area, world's second-largest island, with an area of . Located in Melanesia in the southwestern Pacific Ocean, the island is ...

. The male is rufous brown with an elongated golden crest extending from its golden forehead, dark grey feet and buffish yellow underparts. The female is an unadorned olive brown bird. An Indonesian endemic, the male builds a tower-like ''"maypole-type"'' bower decorated with colored fruit. Originally described in 1895 based on trade skins, this elusive bird remained a mystery for nearly a hundred years, until 31 January 1981 when the American ornithologist

Jared Diamond Jared Mason Diamond (born September 10, 1937) is an American scientist, historian, and author. In 1985 he received a MacArthur Genius Grant, and he has written hundreds of scientific and popular articles and books. His best known is '' Guns, G ...

discovered the home ground of the golden-fronted bowerbird at the

in the

Papua province Papua is a province of Indonesia, comprising the northern coast of Western New Guinea together with island groups in Cenderawasih Bay to the west. It roughly follows the borders of the Papuan customary region of Tabi Saireri, and is divided in ...

of Indonesia. In December 2005, an international team of eleven scientists from the United States, Australia and Indonesia led by

Bruce Beehler Bruce McPherson Beehler (born October 11, 1951, in Baltimore) is an ornithologist and research associate of the Bird Division of the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of Natural History. Prior to this appointment, Beehler worked for Conse ...

traveled to the unexplored areas of Foja Mountains and took the first photographs of the bird.''Lost World'' of New Species Found in Indonesia
news.nationalgeographic.com. February 2006

References

External links

Amblyornis Birds of Western New Guinea

golden-fronted bowerbird The golden-fronted bowerbird (''Amblyornis flavifrons'') is a medium-sized, approximately 24 cm long, brown bowerbird that is endemic to the Foja Mountains in New Guinea. The male is rufous brown with an elongated golden crest extending fro ...

Endemic birds of Indonesia {{passeri-stub