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Lifespan, longevity, and ageing

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Maximum longevity: 24 years (captivity)
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Biology

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Like other curassows, this large forest bird spends much of its time stalking about on the forest floor in search of fallen fruits, berries and seeds, as well as large insects and the occasional small animal (4) (6). This species is monogamous and travels in pairs or in small groups, with the male curassow leading his family and uttering a high-pitched whining whistle when there are signs of danger (4) (6). At other times the group communicate by low-pitched grunting sounds (4) (6). When disturbed, this shy and cautious bird often runs rather than flies away, but will also seek protection up in the trees (2). The great curassow builds its nest of leaves and twigs in forks and depressions in trees (4), into which the female lays two eggs between March and May (9). Once hatched, the chicks develop rapidly and are capable of flight at around 20 days (2), after which they soon leave the nest (2).
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Conservation

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The great curassow is legally protected across much of its range, and occurs in a number of protected areas, in which it remains relatively common or has now recovered from depleted numbers (10).
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Description

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The great curassow is a magnificent bird, so named for its conspicuous size of almost a metre tall (2). The striking species is instantly recognisable by the tousled crest of forward-curling feathers that adorn the length of its crown, and its vivid yellow bill with a bulbous yellow knob at the base that swells and brightens at the height of the breeding season (4) (5) (6). The plumage is predominantly black, faintly glossed with a deep lustrous blue or purple glow, while the belly and under-tail coverts are a contrasting snowy white (5) (7). Females vary in colour, ranging from black to chestnut-brown, sometimes with black and white barring on their breast, head, wings, and tail (4) (6), while the belly and vent are white to a tawny-buff (5) (8). Females can also be distinguished from males by their conspicuous lack of the distinctive yellow bill-knob (9).
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Habitat

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The great curassow is found in undisturbed humid evergreen forest and mangroves, and also seasonally dry forest in some areas (10), at low to medium elevations (6).
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Range

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The nominate subspecies, C. r. rubra, is distributed from eastern Mexico south through Central America (Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica and Panama) to western Colombia and western Ecuador (6) (10). The rarer subspecies, C. r. griscomi, is confined to Cozumel Island off Mexico, where just 300 birds were estimated to survive in 1996 (10) (11).
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Status

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Classified as Near Threatened on the IUCN Red List 2006 (1), and listed on Appendix II of CITES (3).
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Threats

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The great curassow is not immediately endangered because it still has a wide distribution, but it has undergone considerable decline as a result of hunting and habitat loss, and is becoming increasingly dependent for survival upon a few well-maintained reserves (10) (11). Due to its large size and palatability, this bird is a favourite target by hunters, and is widely hunted for food and therefore now highly reduced in numbers near settlements (10) (11). Additionally, deforestation of humid and deciduous tropical forests is a major threat to the survival of this sizeable bird, which is severely reducing and fragmenting its remaining habitat, whilst at the same time opening up the forest to settlements and poachers (4) (6) (10). Whilst subsistence hunters normally take only one bird at a time and are thought to have relatively little impact on populations, the existence of commercial hunting in certain areas is of greater concern, since this typically involves taking entire groups of curassows in one go, which could rapidly lead to local extinctions (12).
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Great curassow

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The great curassow (Crax rubra) is a large, pheasant-like bird from the Neotropical rainforests, its range extending from eastern Mexico, through Central America to western Colombia and northwestern Ecuador. Male birds are black with curly crests and yellow beaks; females come in three colour morphs, barred, rufous and black. These birds form small groups, foraging mainly on the ground for fruits and arthropods, and the occasional small vertebrate, but they roost and nest in trees. This species is monogamous, the male usually building the rather small nest of leaves in which two eggs are laid. This species is threatened by loss of habitat and hunting, and the International Union for Conservation of Nature has rated its conservation status as "vulnerable".

Description

Head of male

At 78–100 cm (31–39 in) in length and 3.1–4.8 kg (6.8–10.6 lb) in weight, this is a very large cracid.[3][4] Females are somewhat smaller than males. It is the most massive and heavy species in the family but its length is matched by a few other cracids.[3][5][6] Three other species of curassow (the northern helmeted, the southern helmeted, and the black are all around the same average length as the great curassow. In this species, standard measurements are as follows: the wing chord is 36 to 42.4 cm (14.2 to 16.7 in), the tail is 29 to 38 cm (11 to 15 in) and the tarsus is 9.4 to 12 cm (3.7 to 4.7 in). They have the largest mean standard measurements in the family, other than tail length.[7]

The male is black with a curly crest, a white belly, and a yellow knob on its bill.[3] There are three morphs of female great curassows:[3] barred morph females with barred neck, mantle, wings and tail; rufous morph with an overall reddish brown plumage and a barred tail; and dark morph female with a blackish neck, mantle and tail (the tail often faintly vermiculated), and some barring to the wings. In most regions only one or two morphs occur, and females showing a level of intermediacy between these morphs are known (e.g. resembling rufous morph, but with black neck and faint vermiculations to the wings).

This species has a similar voice to several other curassows, its call consisting of a "peculiar" lingering whistle.[7]

Ecology

A monogamous species, the great curassow is distributed in rainforest from eastern Mexico throughout Central America, to western Colombia and northwest Ecuador.[3] In Mexico, it is absent from drier western coastal forests but does occasionally occur in dry areas of the Yucatan, Cozumel Island and Costa Rica. The great curassow spends much of its time on the ground, but nests and roosts in trees. This species is gregarious, occurring in groupings of up to a dozen birds, though occasionally birds can be seen alone. Its diet consists mainly of fruits, figs and arthropods. Small vertebrates may supplement the diet on occasion, including small mammals (such as rodents). Unlike other cracids, such as guans, they feed largely on fallen fruit rather than pluck fruit directly from the trees. In Tamaulipas, it feeds largely on the fruit Spondias mombin. Elsewhere, it may prefer the red berries of Chione trees.[7]

The male great curassow may build the nest and attract a female's attention to it, though in other cases both members of a pair will build the nest structure. Two eggs are typically laid in a relatively small nest (usually made largely of leaves), each egg measuring 9.1 cm × 6.7 cm (3.6 in × 2.6 in) and weighing 200 g (7.1 oz). The young curassow weighs 123 g (4.3 oz) upon hatching; 2,760 g (6.08 lb) as a half-year-old immature fledgling; and by a year of age, when fully fledged and independent of parental care, will be about three-quarters of their adult weight at 3,600 g (7.9 lb). This species has been noted for its rather aggressive temperament, which has been regularly directed at humans when the birds are held in captivity. Undoubtedly, they have this inclination in order to repel natural predators, from both themselves and their offspring. Known natural predators of this species have included ocelots and ornate hawk-eagles, though chicks and eggs likely have a broader range of predators. When a potential predator is near their offspring, curassows have been noted to engage in a distraction display, feigning injury. When attacking humans, the curassows leap in fluttering flight and scratch about the head, targeting the eyes. Their lifespan in captivity has reached at least 24 years.[7]

Paleontology

The great curassow is the most northerly Crax species. It is part of a clade that inhabited the north of South America since about 9 mya (Tortonian, Late Miocene). As the Colombian Andes were uplifted around 6 mya, this species' ancestors were cut off from the population to their southeast. The latter would in time evolve into the blue-billed curassow. The ancestral great curassows then spread along the Pacific side of the Andes, and into Central America during the Pliocene and Pleistocene[8] as part of the Great American Interchange.

Status

Due to ongoing habitat loss and overhunting in some areas, the great curassow is evaluated as Vulnerable on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species.[1] It is listed on Appendix III of CITES in Costa Rica, Guatemala, Colombia and Honduras. Of the smaller subspecies C. r. griscomi of Cozumel Island, only a few hundred remain. Its population seems either to have been slowly increasing since the 1980s, or to be fluctuating at a low level; it is vulnerable to hurricanes.[3]

This species has proven to produce fertile hybrids with its closest living relative, the blue-billed curassow, and also with the much more distantly related black curassow.[3]

In Mexico, there are Unidades de Manejo para la Conservación de la Vida Silvestre [Management Units for the Conservation of Wildlife] (UMAs) who are breeding great curassows in captivity.[9]

References

  1. ^ a b BirdLife International (2020). "Crax rubra". IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. 2020: e.T22678521A178001922. doi:10.2305/IUCN.UK.2020-3.RLTS.T22678521A178001922.en. Retrieved 14 November 2021.
  2. ^ del Hoyo, Josep; Kirwan, Guy M. (2020). "Great Curassow (Crax rubra)". In Del Hoyo, Josep; Elliott, Andrew; Sargatal, Jordi; Christie, David; De Juana, Eduardo (eds.). Great Curassow Crax rubra. Handbook of the Birds of the World Alive. doi:10.2173/bow.grecur1.01. S2CID 242884761. Retrieved 16 May 2015.
  3. ^ a b c d e f g del Hoyo, J.; Elliot, A.; Sargatal, J., eds. (1994). "Plate 33". 44. Great Curassow. Handbook of the Birds of the World. Vol. 2 (New World Vultures to Guineafowl). Barcelona: Lynx Edicions. p. 359. ISBN 978-84-87334-15-3.
  4. ^ Arion, Frank Martinus (Summer 1998). "The Great Curassow or the Road to Caribbeanness". Callaloo. Johns Hopkins University Press. 21 (3, Caribbean Literature from Suriname, The Netherlands Antilles, Aruba, and The Netherlands: A Special Issue): 447–452. doi:10.1353/cal.1998.0127. JSTOR 3299577. S2CID 161491776.
  5. ^ Restall; Rodner; Lentino (2006). Birds of Northern South America. London: Christopher Helm. ISBN 0-7136-7243-9 (vol. 1). ISBN 0-7136-7242-0 (vol. 2).
  6. ^ Burton, Maurice; Burton, Robert (2002). International Wildlife Encyclopedia. Marshall Cavendish Corporation, Jan 1, 2002. ISBN 9780761472667.
  7. ^ a b c d Hughes, Nigel (2006). Curassows, Guans and Chachalacas. UK: Wildside Books. ISBN 978-0905062266.
  8. ^ Pereira, Sérgio Luiz; Baker, Allan J. (2004). "Vicariant speciation of curassows (Aves, Cracidae): a hypothesis based on mitochondrial DNA phylogeny". Auk (in English and Spanish). 121 (3): 682–694. doi:10.1642/0004-8038(2004)121[0682:VSOCAC]2.0.CO;2.
  9. ^ Aguilar, Héctor F.; Rivera Guzmán, Roberto A. (2002). "Biología Reproductiva del Hocofaisan Crax rubra rubra Linnaeus 1758, Craciformes: Cracidae) en México, Análisis Químico y Estudio Morfológico de la Cáscara de Huevo" [Breeding Biology of Great Curassow, Crax Rubra Rubra Linnaeus 1758 (Craciformes: Cracidae) in Captivity in Mexico, Chemical Analysis and Morphological Study of Eggshell]. Zoocriaderos (in Spanish). 4 (2): 1–33. ISSN 0798-7811.

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Great curassow: Brief Summary

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The great curassow (Crax rubra) is a large, pheasant-like bird from the Neotropical rainforests, its range extending from eastern Mexico, through Central America to western Colombia and northwestern Ecuador. Male birds are black with curly crests and yellow beaks; females come in three colour morphs, barred, rufous and black. These birds form small groups, foraging mainly on the ground for fruits and arthropods, and the occasional small vertebrate, but they roost and nest in trees. This species is monogamous, the male usually building the rather small nest of leaves in which two eggs are laid. This species is threatened by loss of habitat and hunting, and the International Union for Conservation of Nature has rated its conservation status as "vulnerable".

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