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Jamaican Pauraque
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Jamaican Pauraque
Siphonorhis americana
The Jamaican poorwill (Siphonorhis americana), also known as the Jamaican pauraque or Jamaican least pauraqué, is a species of nightjar in the family Caprimulgidae. It is endemic to Jamaica. Its natural habitats are tropical dry forests and subtropical or tropical dry shrubland. It is critically endangered or possibly already extinct due to a combination of introduced predators and habitat destruction.
From the article Jamaican poorwill on Wikipedia (CC BY-SA), quoted section by section
Description
The Jamaican poorwill is known only from a very few specimens, the most recent of which was collected in the mid 1800s. It is 23 to 25 cm (9.1 to 9.8 in) long. The male's upperparts are rufous brown with blackish streaks. It has a faint rufous buff collar on the hindneck. The chin and upper throat are rufous, the lower throat clear white, the breast rufous with faint narrow brown barring, and the belly and flanks buff with brown bars and large whitish spots. The tail is mostly rufous brown with brown flecks and bars; all but the central feathers have white tips. The female is similar to the male, but somewhat less rufous overall; its underparts are more heavily spotted and the tips of the tail feathers are buffy. It possessed distinct 2 mm long tubular nostrils that differentiated it from its relatives on the mainland.
Range & habitat
The few specimens of Jamaican poorwill from known localities were collected on the south side of the island. It was described as rare to locally uncommon during the first half of the 19th century. The habitats in Jamaica's south side included low elevation dry limestone forest, semi-open woodland, and open country.
Wikipedia: “Distribution and habitat”
What it does
The Jamaican poorwill is assumed to have been a nocturnal aerial insectivore like the least poorwill.
Wikipedia: “Feeding”
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Where it lives
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geo-referenced records in GBIF, from museums, herbaria and field observers.
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Every page naming Siphonorhis americana in the Biodiversity Heritage Library →
This page is assembled live from iNaturalist, GBIF, Wikipedia, the Source Library and the Internet Archive. It is not yet part of the hand-edited codex. iNaturalist taxon 19655.