Wood Hoopoe
The Wood hoopoes and scimitarbills are a small African family, Phoeniculidae, of near passerine birds. They live south of the Sahara Desert and are not migratory. While the family is now restricted to sub-Saharan Africa, fossil evidence shows that the family once had a larger distribution. Fossils attributed to this family have been found in Miocene rocks in Germany.
The wood hoopoes are related to the kingfishers, the rollers, and the Hoopoe, forming a clade with this last according to Hackett et al. (2008). A close relationship between the Hoopoe and the woodhoopoes is also supported by the shared and unique nature of their stapes. They most resemble the true Hoopoe with their long down-curved bills and short rounded wings. According to genetic studies, the two genera Phoeniculus and Rhinopomastus, appear to have diverged about 10 million years ago, so some systematists treat them as separate subfamilies or even separate families.
Read more about Wood Hoopoe: Description, Range and Behaviour, Species
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