14 : Long-billed Sunbird

Long-billed Sunbird - Nectarinia lotenia

There are 130 species of these delightful birds according to my Collin's Birds of the World. I had never seen a sunbird until I moved to Dubai and specifically hunted one down in Safa Park. These are small birds usually but this species seen in Sri Lanka is much larger than the sunbirds I am used to seeing in Dubai.

The bills are all adapted for probing different 'makes and shapes' of flowers. They are filling the same niche as new world humming birds but are completely unrelated. It's what you call convergent evolution. Both families of birds have independantly developed long bills adapted to take advantage of the high energy food available from flowers, irridescent plumage and they can hover.

Again I'd recomend a delve into the books of Dawkins. Seals and whales are a good example of convergent evolution - both are mammals adapted to return to the sea. A whale is closer to a pig though in evolutionary terms than a seal which is of itself closer to a dog or a wolf. They have got back into the sea along a different path.

This Long-billed Sunbird really does what it says on the tin. I was suprised to learn when reading up today that they also take spiders to get a bit more protein with their nectar when breeding. This long bill is obviously highly adapted for very long tubular flowers but it also allows them to catch spiders lurking in the bottom of the flower bowls.

The photograph was taken of a bird resting on the roof of a bungalow we stayed at in Sri Lanka called Ellertons near Kandy.

Long-billed Sunbird - Nectarinia Lotenia
Hills near Kandy, Sri Lanka - 10 April 2011.