H.J. Ruiz – Avian101 – Page 820 – "My Backyard Visitors" – All about birds

Chilean Pintail

The Chilean Pintail aka Brown Pintail, is one of three subspecies of the Yellow-billed Pintail, and by far the most numerous and widespread. It is found throughout much of South America from extreme southern Colombia southwards to Tierra del Fuego, as well as in the Falkland Islands. The two other subspecies are the smaller South Georgia Pintail which is limited to the subantarctic island of South Georgia and which is sometimes considered a separate species, and the extinct Niceforo’s Pintail, which occurred formerly in central Colombia.

Chilean Pintails inhabit freshwater lakes, rivers, marshes, lagoons and flooded meadows up to 4600 m above sea level in the puna zone of the Andes. Populations in the northern parts of the range are mainly sedentary; those further south migrate for the austral winter as far north as southern Brazil.

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Helmeted Guineafowl

The Helmeted Guineafowl is the best known of the guineafowl bird family, Numididae, and the only member of the genus Numida. It breeds in Africa, mainly south of the Sahara, and has been widely introduced into the West Indies, Brazil, Australia and southern France.

The Helmeted Guineafowl is a large bird with a round body and small head. The body plumage is gray-black spangled with white. Like other guineafowl, this species has an unfeathered head, in this case decorated with a dull yellow or reddish bony knob, and red and blue patches of skin. The wings are short and rounded, and the tail is also short. Various sub-species are proposed, differences in appearance being mostly a large variation in shape, size and color of the casque and facial wattles.

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