Edwards's Pheasant
Edwards's Pheasant, Lophura edwardsi, is a bird of the pheasant family Phasianidae and is endemic to the rainforests of Vietnam. It is named after the French ornithologist Alphonse Milne-Edwards and first described to science in 1896 The bird's length is 58–65 centimetres (23–26 in) and has red legs and facial skin. The male is mainly blue-black with a crest, and the female is a drab brown bird. Edwards′s Pheasant is almost identical to the similarly-sized Vietnamese Pheasant, which it overlaps with throughout its range. The male bird however lacks the white tail feathers of that species. The alarm call is a puk!-puk!-puk!.
There are two varieties; the nominate form L. e. edwardsi has a white crest and upper tail, whereas the northern form L. e. hatinhensis is found with a variable number of white retrices. This difference in the two forms may be due to inbreeding of a restricted, fragmented population there, and has also been seen in captive, inbred L. e. edwardsi. The northern form is sometimes given a separate species status by some authors, Vietnamese Pheasant, Lophura hatinhensis (Vo Quy, 1975).
There are two varieties; the nominate form L. e. edwardsi has a white crest and upper tail, whereas the northern form L. e. hatinhensis is found with a variable number of white retrices. This difference in the two forms may be due to inbreeding of a restricted, fragmented population there, and has also been seen in captive, inbred L. e. edwardsi. The northern form is sometimes given a separate species status by some authors, Vietnamese Pheasant, Lophura hatinhensis (Vo Quy, 1975).
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| Edwards's Pheasant |
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