Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
Many birds have feeding specializations that take advantage of the vast array of
potential food sources within the Neotropical rainforest. Large insectivorous birds
endemic to the Neotropical rainforest include potoos, puffbirds, motmots, and
jacamars. Smaller endemic insect feeders include antbirds, ovenbirds, wrens, and
vireos, to name just a few. These birds exploit all the layers of the forest from the
ground to the understory and upper canopy, as well as different plants or parts of
plants (bark, twigs, leaf undersides, and so on).
Some birds, including many parrots, macaws, and parakeets, feed primarily on
fruit (frugivores). The cave-nesting Oilbird specializes in palm nuts. Toucans, hoat-
zins, and trogons feed primarily on fruits and seeds, but also take insects on occa-
sion. Many of the frugivores are separated by size as well as where they get their
food. Toucans, parrots, and macaws pick fruit from canopy trees; smaller birds like
manakins and tanagers exploit fruit, flowers, and seeds in the lower canopy layers.
Quetzals are beautiful but weak fliers; they are fruit eaters in the understory and
lower canopy. Curassows and pigeons take advantage of fruit that has fallen to the
forest floor. Beaks on birds like parrots and macaws are hooked and powerful and
are able to pierce the tough tusks and skins of fruit to uncover the juicy pulp and
seeds within. Other birds have developed beaks suitable for prying seeds from
hard-coated fruits.
Hummingbirds are restricted to the Americas. They are nectar feeders and dif-
ferent species evolved diverse bill lengths that allow each to specialize on a differ-
ent set of flowers. Many tropical hummingbirds have curved beaks.
The Neotropical rainforest hosts a variety of ground birds, including trumpeters
and terrestrial cuckoos, curassows, guans, chachalacas, and tinamous, as well as
pigeons. These birds consume small reptiles and insects, as well as fruit that has
fallen to the forest floor.
The rainforest is home to a variety of carnivorous birds. Diurnal raptors vary in
size from the Tiny Hawk of Panama weighing 2.5 oz (75 g) to the majestic Harpy
Eagle that can weigh more than 20 lbs (9 kg). The rainforest also hosts a diversity
of falcons and caracaras that hunt along the many waterways. Owls are nocturnal
hunters within the forest. Vultures are important carrion feeders in the Neotropics.
Reptiles and Amphibians
Snakes, turtles, lizards, crocodiles, and frogs are among the many reptiles and
amphibians that inhabit the Neotropical rainforest. Snakes are grouped as vipers
and pit vipers, cobras and coral snakes, constrictors (boas and pythons), and other
nonconstricting, nonpoisonous snakes. Pit vipers are the most deadly snakes in the
world. Pit vipers range from North America into the Neotropics and throughout
South America. Pit vipers have large triangular shaped heads and slit shaped pupils
(see Plate VIII). They are named for the sensory depression or pit located between
their nostrils and eyes that they use to sense warm-blooded prey. Pit vipers have
sharp needle-like fangs that can deliver a lethal dose of poison and affect the blood
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