The standard-winged nightjar (''Caprimulgus longipennis'') is a nocturnal

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

nightjar Nightjars are medium-sized nocturnal or crepuscular birds in the family Caprimulgidae and order Caprimulgiformes, characterised by long wings, short legs, and very short bills. They are sometimes called bugeaters, their primary source of food ...

family. Previously placed with the

pennant-winged nightjar The pennant-winged nightjar (''Caprimulgus vexillarius'') is a species of nightjar that occurs from Nigeria to northern South Africa. It is an intra-African migrant and displays remarkable sexual dimorphism in the breeding season. Range and ha ...

(''Caprimulgus vexillarius'') in their own

genus Genus (; : genera ) is a taxonomic rank above species and below family (taxonomy), family as used in the biological classification of extant taxon, living and fossil organisms as well as Virus classification#ICTV classification, viruses. In bino ...

, ''

Macrodipteryx ''Macrodipteryx'' is a genus of African nightjars consisting of two species: the pennant-winged nightjar and the standard-winged nightjar. They inhabit subtropical woodlands, and the males of both species acquire strikingly elongated primaries i ...

'', it is native to

Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent after Asia. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 20% of Earth's land area and 6% of its total surfac ...

and displays extreme

sexual dimorphism Sexual dimorphism is the condition where sexes of the same species exhibit different Morphology (biology), morphological characteristics, including characteristics not directly involved in reproduction. The condition occurs in most dioecy, di ...

. During the breeding season, males will grow broad ornamental

flight feathers Flight feathers (''Pennae volatus'') are the long, stiff, asymmetrically shaped, but symmetrically paired pennaceous feathers on the wings or tail of a bird; those on the wings are called remiges (), singular remex (), while those on the tai ...

longer than their body.

Distribution and habitat

The standard-winged nightjar is a resident breeder in

from southern

Senegal Senegal, officially the Republic of Senegal, is the westernmost country in West Africa, situated on the Atlantic Ocean coastline. It borders Mauritania to Mauritania–Senegal border, the north, Mali to Mali–Senegal border, the east, Guinea t ...

east to

Ethiopia Ethiopia, officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, is a landlocked country located in the Horn of Africa region of East Africa. It shares borders with Eritrea to the north, Djibouti to the northeast, Somalia to the east, Ken ...

. It spends the non-breeding season in the

Sahel The Sahel region (; ), or Sahelian acacia savanna, is a Biogeography, biogeographical region in Africa. It is the Ecotone, transition zone between the more humid Sudanian savannas to its south and the drier Sahara to the north. The Sahel has a ...

region to the north. Its habitat includes lightly wooded

savanna A savanna or savannah is a mixed woodland-grassland (i.e. grassy woodland) biome and ecosystem characterised by the trees being sufficiently widely spaced so that the canopy does not close. The open canopy allows sufficient light to reach th ...

, with some scrub, as well as

agricultural land Agricultural land is typically land ''devoted to'' agriculture, the systematic and controlled use of other organism, forms of lifeparticularly the rearing of livestock and production of cropsto produce food for humans. It is generally synonymous ...

in thickly wooded savanna. It has been observed at elevations as high as in Ethiopia, but is typically found from sea level up to elevations of .

Description

When roosting on the ground during the day, this medium-sized ( long) nightjar is mainly variegated grey, with a browner collar. It has a shadowy form with easy, silent

moth Moths are a group of insects that includes all members of the order Lepidoptera that are not Butterfly, butterflies. They were previously classified as suborder Heterocera, but the group is Paraphyly, paraphyletic with respect to butterflies (s ...

-like flight; this nightjar is relatively short-tailed, and lacks white in the wings or tail. The song is a churring trill. The adult male grows a wing ornament during the breeding season which consists of a broad secondary flight feather on each wing elongated to up to , over twice the length of the bird's body. In normal flight, these feathers trail behind, but in display flight they are displayed like

standards Standard may refer to: Symbols * Colours, standards and guidons, kinds of military signs * Standard (emblem), a type of a large symbol or emblem used for identification Norms, conventions or requirements * Standard (metrology), an object t ...

. These large feathers have been postulated as a feature developed through intense

sexual selection Sexual selection is a mechanism of evolution in which members of one sex mate choice, choose mates of the other sex to mating, mate with (intersexual selection), and compete with members of the same sex for access to members of the opposite sex ...

. Outside the breeding season, the female is distinguished from the male by its smaller size and similarity to the

, notably the patch of white on the throat and dark barring on the belly.

Behaviour

Like other nightjars, the standard-winged nightjar feeds on insects in flight, their mouths opening wide for

s and

beetle Beetles are insects that form the Taxonomic rank, order Coleoptera (), in the superorder Holometabola. Their front pair of wings are hardened into wing-cases, elytra, distinguishing them from most other insects. The Coleoptera, with about 40 ...

s. It flies at dusk, when the highest quantity of prey is available, though its foraging patterns change depending on moonlight, with later, more nocturnal foraging correlated with higher levels of moonlight. It may also feed on swarms of insects disturbed by fires and artificial lights, a behaviour which has been linked to

bird strike A bird strike (sometimes called birdstrike, bird ingestion (for an engine), bird hit, or bird aircraft strike hazard (BASH)) is a collision between an airborne animal (usually a bird or bat) and a moving vehicle (usually an aircraft). The term ...

by cars when their lights illuminate roads. During breeding season, male and (less frequently) female standard-winged nightjars will gather in patches of soil with little vegetation to forage and for males to perform display flights. Such behaviour has been considered a form of

lekking A lek is an aggregation of male animals gathered to engage in competitive displays and courtship rituals, known as lekking, to entice visiting females which are surveying prospective partners with which to mate. It can also refer to a space us ...

. Outside of breeding season, standard-winged nightjars have been observed traveling in groups of up to 20 individual birds. No

nest A nest is a structure built for certain animals to hold Egg (biology), eggs or young. Although nests are most closely associated with birds, members of all classes of vertebrates and some invertebrates construct nests. They may be composed of ...

is made; in each

clutch A clutch is a mechanical device that allows an output shaft to be disconnected from a rotating input shaft. The clutch's input shaft is typically attached to a motor, while the clutch's output shaft is connected to the mechanism that does th ...

, two elliptical, slightly glossy eggs are placed upon bare sandy soil.

Nomenclature

Though the standard-winged nightjar was originally placed in the

Caprimulgus ''Caprimulgus'' is a large and very widespread genus of nightjars, medium-sized nocturnal birds with long pointed wings, short legs and short bills. ''Caprimulgus'' is derived from the Latin ''capra'', "nanny goat", and ''mulgere'', "to milk", re ...

'' as in its first identification by George Shaw in 1796, it was later placed in the genus ''

'' along with the

. A

phylogenetic In biology, phylogenetics () is the study of the evolutionary history of life using observable characteristics of organisms (or genes), which is known as phylogenetic inference. It infers the relationship among organisms based on empirical dat ...

study done in 2010 deprecated ''Macrodipteryx'', placing both the pennant-winged nightjar and standard-winged nightjar species within ''Caprimulgus''. The two species are closely related, despite their differences in breeding ranges and breeding seasons.

Ecology and conservation

Standard-winged nightjars are

migratory birds Bird migration is a seasonal movement of birds between breeding and wintering grounds that occurs twice a year. It is typically from north to south or from south to north. Migration is inherently risky, due to predation and mortality. The ...

and travel to and from breeding grounds annually. The precise breeding season varies based on region, and is affected by prey availability and rain; populations that live in more southern regions breed earlier than those in northern regions. The standard-winged nightjar population is not considered to be under threat and is 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 wild ...

by the

International Union for Conservation of Nature The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) is an international organization working in the field of nature conservation and sustainable use of natural resources. Founded in 1948, IUCN has become the global authority on the stat ...

(IUCN) 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 ...

References

External links

* {{Taxonbar, from=Q27074767 Birds described in 1796 Birds of Sub-Saharan Africa Caprimulgus