Schlegel’s Asity (Philepitta schlegeli) is endemic to Madagascar.
This fantastic bird belongs to the Philepittidae family. Its natural habitats are subtropical or tropical dry forests and subtropical or tropical moist lowland forests.
The Schlegel’s Asity is a 12·5 to 14 cm small bird, rotund, short-tailed, with short bills and legs. The male of Schlegel’s asity is yellow after molting, with the exception of its black crown, and the wattle extends around the eye. The adult male breeding head is mostly black, brilliant apple-green wattle. The female is greenish. This species has elaborate secondary sexual characters.
Adult breeding males of Schlegel’s Asity have supraorbital caruncles, which are featherless, fleshy excrescences of the dermis above the eye. These caruncles are pearly light green below and in front of the eyes, blue above the eyes, and turquoise behind the eyes. The species is perhaps polygynous, with dispersed male leks. The nest is globular and suspended from a low branch of an understory tree.
It is constructed from moss, bark, and leaf strips, held together with spiders’ webs. Laying dates are probably at least between October and December. The male is distinctive; however, the female can be distinguished from the Velvet Asity by the pale fleshy eye-ring and the yellow-tinged underparts. Thus, hints often feed from flowering trees in the canopy of the western deciduous forest or on fruits in the understory. Velvet asities consume berries and other fruit in the undergrowth, and they make hanging nests with a little roof over the entrance.
The male bird song is a quiet but penetrating whistle of 7–9 notes, rising and then falling. The bird is largely frugivorous, especially in the rainy season. The diet consists of fruits, including those of Cabucala (Apocynaceae). The population size of this species has not been quantified, but it is described as rather scarce. Schlegel’s Asity is nearly threatened due to habitat loss.
This bird’s whole woodland habitat in Madagascar is under significant human pressure. The dry forests within this species’ range are threatened by burning and cattle-grazing, as well as by the extraction of wood for fuel and construction,.
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