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Updated: May 20, 2025
It has been named Henicophaps albifrons. I collected only seventy-three species of birds in Waigiou, but twelve of them were entirely new, and many others very rare; and as I brought away with me twenty-four fine specimens of the Paradisea rubra, I did not regret my visit to the island, although it had by no means answered my expectations.
However, the very first time I went into the forest I not only heard but saw them, and was convinced there were plenty about; but they were very shy, and it was some time before we got any. My hunter first shot a female, and I one day got very close to a fine male. He was, as I expected, the rare red species, Paradisea rubra, which alone inhabits this island, and is found nowhere else.
The group ranges nearly over the whole area inhabited by the family of the Paradiseidae, but each of the species has its own limited region, and is never found in the same district with either of its close allies. To these three birds properly belongs the generic title Paradisea, or true Paradise Bird.
Beneath, it is of a paler yellowish brown, scaled and banded with narrow dusky markings. The young males are exactly like the female, and they no doubt undergo a series of changes as singular as those of Paradisea rubra; but, unfortunately, I was unable to obtain illustrative specimens.
Not one of them possesses these spiral-tipped tail wires nor these beautiful breast fans. Then look at the colours. What art can in any way approach them! This is the King Bird of Paradise the Paradisea Regia, we naturalists call it. Well worthy is it of the name."
Americana: Birds, p. 362. References in regard to the assemblages of other birds have already been given. On Paradisea, see Wallace, in 'Annals and Mag. of Nat. Hist. vol. xx. 1857, p. 412. Some of the above birds, the black-cock, capercailzie, pheasant-grouse, ruff, solitary snipe, and perhaps others, are, as is believed, polygamists.
The female differs remarkably front the same sex in Paradisea apoda, by being entirely white on the under surface of the body, and is thus a much handsomer bird. The young males are similarly coloured, and as they grow older they change to brown, and go through the same stages in acquiring the perfect plumage as has already been described in the allied species.
The next species is the Paradisea regia of Linnaeus, or Ding Bird of Paradise, which differs so much from the three preceding species as to deserve a distinct generic name, and it has accordingly been called Cicinnurus regius. By the Malays it is called "Burong rajah," or King Bird, and by the natives of the Aru Islands "Goby-goby."
Bernstein, is very like that of Cicinnurus regius, being similarly banded beneath; and we may therefore conclude that its near ally, the "Magnificent," is at least equally plain in this sex, of which specimens have not yet been obtained. The Superb Bird of Paradise was first figured by Buffon, and was named by Boddaert, Paradisea atra, from the black ground colour of its plumage.
This bird, frequents the lower trees of the forests, and, like most Paradise Birds, is in constant motion flying from branch to branch, clinging to the twigs and even to the smooth and vertical trunks almost as easily as a woodpecker. It continually utters a harsh, creaking note, somewhat intermediate between that of Paradisea apoda, and the more musical cry of Cicinnurus regius.
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