Standard-winged Nightjar - Description

Description

The adult male has a bizarre wing ornament during the breeding season, with a broad central flight feather on each wing elongated to 38 cm, much longer than the bird's body. 20 cm or more of this is bare shaft. In normal flight, these feathers trail behind, but in display flight they are raised vertically like standards. Outside the breeding season, there are no plumage distinctions between the male and female.

When roosting on the ground during the day, this medium-sized (20–23 cm long) nightjar is mainly variegated grey, with a browner collar. It is a shadowy form with easy, silent moth-like flight; this nightjar is relatively short-tailed, and lacks white in the wings or tail. The song is a churring trill.

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