Shimmering looks of Common Kingfishers
SOME people like Common Kingfishers because of their colourful and lovely looks, especially when they perch on a tree branch or a post and when they hover above water.
Others like them because of their swift and highly-skilled fishing technique, or because of their shyness and their high-pitched voice.
Common Kingfishers are characterised by their large heads, short tails, long bills and shorts legs. Their plumages are extremely colourful with shimmering blue-green upper parts and orange lower parts.
Their breeding season extends from mid-March to the end of July. Once the male and female have paired, they begin to build a nest. Interestingly, same as other Kingfishers, the Common Kingfishers are hole nesters.
At Mai Po, they usually excavate a long tunnel in the beds of gei wais which are the traditional tidal ponds for fish and shrimp culture.
After completion of the nest, the male will present the female with a gift of fish and once the female have accepted and eaten, mating takes place.
Clutches consist of three to seven eggs which are laid in the unlined nest chamber. Incubation takes 19 to 21 days and the young take 23 to 17 days to fledge.
