Resplendent Quetzal

Resplendent Quetzal

Resplendent Queztal: This large trogon is widely considered the most beautiful bird in the world with its bright red underparts and glittering green head and back. Also has elegant green shoulder plumes and a unique green helmeted look. Male's have 2 foot long lacy streamers hanging from their tails with females lack. Females are less vibrantly colored and have black and white banded tails and dusky gray bellies. Juveniles resemble females but have sooty or bronzy upperparts.

● Song: "keow", "perwicka"

● Foraging & Feeding: Resplendent Quetzal: A sedate perching bird that sallies forth to snatch fruits from hanging branches. May eat insects or small vertebrates but specializes on fruit in the Lauraceae (Avocado) Family.

● Breeding & nesting: Resplendent Quetzal: Lays two pale blue eggs in the cavity of a decaying tree trunk or stump, 10 to 60 feet high. Uses old woodpecker holes or carve out its own cavity if the wood is soft enough. Breeding season is March through June. Both parents tend to the eggs and chicks. Eggs take 18 to 19 days to hatch. Chicks are born with vestigal claws on the bend in their wings but these are lost by the time they leave the nest 25 to 27 days later.

● Similar species:

Flight Pattern