The fire-tufted barbet (''Psilopogon pyrolophus'') is a species of

bird Birds are a group of warm-blooded vertebrates constituting the class (biology), class Aves (), characterised by feathers, toothless beaked jaws, the Oviparity, laying of Eggshell, hard-shelled eggs, a high Metabolism, metabolic rate, a fou ...

in the Asian barbet

family Family (from ) is a Social group, group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or Affinity (law), affinity (by marriage or other relationship). It forms the basis for social order. Ideally, families offer predictabili ...

Megalaimidae Megalaimidae, the Asian barbets, are a family of birds, comprising two genera with 35 species native to the forests of the Indomalayan realm from Tibet to Indonesia. They were once clubbed with all barbets in the family Capitonidae but the Old Wo ...

. It is native to

Peninsular Malaysia Peninsular Malaysia, historically known as Malaya and also known as West Malaysia or the Malaysian Peninsula, is the western part of Malaysia that comprises the southern part of the Malay Peninsula on Mainland Southeast Asia and the list of isla ...

and

Sumatra Sumatra () is one of the Sunda Islands of western Indonesia. It is the largest island that is fully within Indonesian territory, as well as the list of islands by area, sixth-largest island in the world at 482,286.55 km2 (182,812 mi. ...

, where it inhabits tropical moist lowland and montane forests. It has been listed as

Least Concern A least-concern species is a species that has been evaluated and categorized by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) as not being a focus of wildlife conservation because the specific species is still plentiful in the wil ...

on the

IUCN Red List The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List of Threatened Species, also known as the IUCN Red List or Red Data Book, founded in 1964, is an inventory of the global conservation status and extinction risk of biological ...

since 2004. Its

scientific name In Taxonomy (biology), taxonomy, binomial nomenclature ("two-term naming system"), also called binary nomenclature, is a formal system of naming species of living things by giving each a name composed of two parts, both of which use Latin gramm ...

was proposed by

Salomon Müller Salomon Müller (7 April 1804 – 29 December 1864) was a German natural history, naturalist. He was born in Heidelberg, and died in Freiburg im Breisgau. Müller was the son of a saddler in Heidelberg. Along with Heinrich Boie and Heinrich Christi ...

in 1836, who described a barbet from Sumatra.

Description

The fire-tufted barbet is green with a brownish-maroon nape, grey lores, and a white band on the forehead. Its throat is green, followed by a bright yellow band before a black band, appearing like a necklace. The bill is fawn coloured with a black vertical band. It has tufts of feathers at the base of beak. The upper tufts of males are fiery orange. The adult fire-tufted barbet is long.

Distribution and habitat

The fire-tufted barbet inhabits

broad-leaved A broad-leaved, broad-leaf, or broadleaf tree is any tree within the diverse botanical group of angiosperms that has flat leaves and produces seeds inside of fruits. It is one of two general types of trees, the other being a conifer, a tree with ne ...

evergreen In botany, an evergreen is a plant which has Leaf, foliage that remains green and functional throughout the year. This contrasts with deciduous plants, which lose their foliage completely during the winter or dry season. Consisting of many diffe ...

montane forests between on the

Malay Peninsula The Malay Peninsula is located in Mainland Southeast Asia. The landmass runs approximately north–south, and at its terminus, it is the southernmost point of the Asian continental mainland. The area contains Peninsular Malaysia, Southern Tha ...

and Sumatra. Three fire-tufted barbets observed on

Mount Gede Mount Gede (; in Sundanese) is a stratovolcano in West Java, Indonesia. The volcano contains two peaks with Mount Gede as one peak and Mount Pangrango for the other one. Three major cities, Cianjur, Sukabumi, and Bogor, are located in the volc ...

West Java West Java (, ) is an Indonesian Provinces of Indonesia, province on the western part of the island of Java, with its provincial capital in Bandung. West Java is bordered by the province of Banten and the country's capital region of Jakarta to t ...

between 2003 and 2005 are thought to have escaped from aviaries in this area.

Behaviour and ecology

The fire-tufted barbet is a resident bird and feeds on

figs The fig is the edible fruit of ''Ficus carica'', a species of tree or shrub in the flowering plant family Moraceae, native to the Mediterranean region, together with western and southern Asia. It has been cultivated since ancient times and i ...

, other fruits,

arthropod Arthropods ( ) are invertebrates in the phylum Arthropoda. They possess an arthropod exoskeleton, exoskeleton with a cuticle made of chitin, often Mineralization (biology), mineralised with calcium carbonate, a body with differentiated (Metam ...

s and insects. Its call is very similar to that of

cicada The cicadas () are a superfamily, the Cicadoidea, of insects in the order Hemiptera (true bugs). They are in the suborder Auchenorrhyncha, along with smaller jumping bugs such as leafhoppers and froghoppers. The superfamily is divided into two ...

Threats

The fire-tufted barbet is primarily threatened by illegal capture and trade as a pet.

References

External links

fire-tufted barbet The fire-tufted barbet (''Psilopogon pyrolophus'') is a species of bird in the Asian barbet family (biology), family Megalaimidae. It is native to Peninsular Malaysia and Sumatra, where it inhabits tropical moist lowland and montane forests. It h ...

Birds of the Malay Peninsula Birds of Malaysia Birds of Sumatra Taxa named by Salomon Müller

Articles containing video clips Taxonomy articles created by Polbot {{Piciformes-stub