Salvin’s Curassow (Mitu salvini)

Identification & Behavior: ~86.5 cm (34 in). The Salvin’s Curassow is a turkey-like bird. They are black with iridescent bluish feathers and velvety black upper neck and head.  Males and females are similar in having a terminal white tail band, white in the lower belly and vent areas, and a bright red bill with the culmen elongated and shaped into a sharp ridge (more developed in males). Very similar to Razor-billed Curassow, but these curassows replace each other geographically with Salvin’s Curassow restricted to the north side of the Amazon and  Marañon Rivers and Razor-billed Curassow to the south of the Amazon and Marañon Rivers.

Status: The Salvin’s Curassow favors floodplain forest where it is now rare due to excessive subsistence hunting.

Name in Spanish: Paujil de Salvin.

Sub-species: Salvin’s Curassow (Mitu salvini) Reinhardt, 1879.

Meaning of Name: Crax: not explained. salvini: After English ornithologist and collector Obster Salvin.

See more of the Family Cracidae