Marvelous Spatuletail Loddigesia mirabilis.
The Marvelous Spatuletail is an endemic bird to Peru. One of the most spectacular things to witness in the birding world is the display of the males spatuletails. Our guide (then) Roger Ahlman together with our protegé Santos Montenegro were the first to witness this remarkable lek in over a 100 years in 2003.
Spatuletail history.
Untill recently the biology of the Spatuletail was little known – and males were rarely seen. For exmple Ted Parker reports that 2 out of 35 sightings were adult males. This, together with reports from Taczanowski and Stolzmann in 1881, concluded that there was a sqewed sex ratio – with females and immatures greatly out-numbering adult males. However, Santos have found males at specific sites and it is now not difficult to see the males. It appears that the males may have different selection of habitat prefering shrubby areas and keeping low in the vegetation making them more difficult to spot.
More info -
http://birdingblogs.com/2011/Gunnar/want-to-see-the-marvellous-spatuletail-displaying
