Iberian Azure-winged Magpie
Cyanopica cooki
Passeriforme Order - Corvidae family
BIOMETRICS :
Length: 34-35cm ; Weight: 65-75 gr
DESCRIPTION:
The Azure-winged magpie has intense black head and nape extending down under the eyes. The wings are blue, with black inner webs on primaries. The blue tail is very long, 190 to 197 millimetres. The upperparts are pinkish brown, with light grey iridescence. The underparts are pinkish brown too, except the white throat, and the very pale upper breast. The bill is strong and black, but less large than in Black-billed Magpie (Pica pica).
Juveniles are darker and brownish, with buffy tips on the blackish head. Wing coverts and upperparts are brownish, with a blue gray iridescence. The tail feathers are white-tipped.
VOICE:
If they are scared when in flocks, the Azure-winged Magpies utter their call “rii-rii” while they move away. They have a varied repertoire. They give some “krarraaj” followed by a repeated “kuink-kuink-kuin”. The first notes are high-pitched and rough, and the others, faster and metallic. It could be an alarm call. Other sounds such as softer “uii-ui-uii-iu” are whistles with high-pitched end. During the nesting period, the most common call is a strong, raucous “shriii”.
HABITAT:
The Azure-winged Magpie occurs at varied levels, but always below 1600 meters of elevation, in thickets or forests. It prefers woodlands with oaks and-or pines, but it also accepts the orchards near rivers. It frequents clearings, tracks, roadsides and desert areas with scattered trees, but never far from the trees where it hides if alarmed, while calling strongly.
RANGE:
The main area is South-eastern Asia, from Russia to Japan, Korea and China. But an isolated population is living in Spain and Portugal, some thousands of kilometres beyond, in Western Europe.
ORIGINS:
The Azure-winged Magpies living in Spain and Portugal could be the result of introduced birds at the 15th century by East trading posts’ former merchants. However, the discovery of fossils of this species, going back to 40.000 years, on Gibraltar in 2000, finally imposed and proved that this species was in the area since a very long time. Recent genetic studies indicate two separated species, one in Europe and the other in Asia. The two populations could be split up more by the attack of the ices of the Quaternary, than by the predation by lynxes and Imperial Eagles. As the weather was increasingly cold, the European populations of Azure-winged magpies could be pushed and “trapped” in Spain and in Portugal.
BEHAVIOUR:
The Azure-winged Magpie is very noisy and gregarious, living in groups all year round. It is very sedentary, occurring in a wide territory which it leaves only if weather conditions are bad. It regularly moves within this area.
It is a bird always anxious and noisy, but these continuous calls seem to maintain the cohesion within the group. In the evening, they gather at nighttimes roosts where can meet hundreds of individuals and even more.
Extraordinarily aggressive in front of the intruders, especially in nesting period, the Azure-winged Magpie attacks any intruder, small or large, including human, if it approaches too much the nest. Numerous calls alert the dispersed pairs and groups which call together and attack the predator. The Azure-winged Magpie nests in loose colonies, about 14 pairs within one hectare.
To feed, it forages and pecks on the ground. For fruits or carrion, it holds the item with a leg and pulls out with the bill. It easily pursues and catches insects in flight. In winter, it comes closer to the human habitations and recovers the remains in the dustbins. It also knows how to extract larvae from the bark crevices.
The courtship displays start in winter. The male approaches the female with half-opened and vibrating wings, inclining the slightly fanned tail towards her. It bows the head and walks laterally with eagerness, while turning around the female. These displays are noisy and occur in dense groups which chase each others on the ground and under the trees, climbing up and down the branches. The males show erected nape feathers.
This species is very sociable in all situations, protecting the young of other pair if they fall from the nest, defending in groups the nesting area and chasing away the potential intruders.
FLIGHT :
The Azure-winged Magpie performs fast flight with short wing beats when it escapes. If not, it flies from tree to tree, and quickly rises to the tip after a low flight.
REPRODUCTION:
The Azure-winged Magpie’s nest has a structure made with equal –sized sticks accounting almost the half of the nest. Then, we find lichens, rags and paper, forming a fine lining under a layer of packed earth of about five millimetres of thickness. The interior of the cup is made with 60% moss, and small pieces of paper, clothes, bits of wool and animal’s hairs. The nest is built by the both mates in a tree, at variable heights, from 3 to 15 metres above the ground. Most of the nests are turned eastwards, either on the first branch of a tree, or in the final fork of the pines but not higher than 8 metres. The construction lasts between 10 and 15 days. An old nest is never re-used.
In early June, the female lays 5 to 6 pale buff, greyish, whitish and even greenish eggs, mottled dark and with purplish or grey markings. The incubation lasts approximately 17 days, by female. The male feeds her every half-hour, and removes the droppings from the nest. At hatching, the chicks are covered with very pale and rare down. The female eats the shells in the nest. The adults feed the chicks by regurgitation, on average 5 to 6 times per hour. The parents’ arrival at nest is greeted by intense squawking, but if a danger threats them, the adults alert the young with a particular call, and the chicks bunch up immediately at the bottom of the nest and keep silent.
When they leave the nest, their tail is still short and the wings little developed. At 17 days, they can be held and move into the branches around the nest, following their parents and begging food. Until 4 to 5 months of age, we recognize the young thanks to their grey head instead black.
DIET:
The Azure-winged Magpie feeds on fruits, berries, insects, seeds, grass, stems and small reptiles. It is an omnivore, eating all kinds of food items, but it likes a lot large insects in spring and summer, and seeds and fruits in autumn and winter, and also carrion. It consumes earth worms and larvae, pine processionary caterpillars, and also flying insects such as flying ants, and grasshoppers of all sizes. According to the areas, it also feeds on acorns and olives. It frequents the boundaries of the habitations where it takes garbage in winter.
PROTECTION / THREATS / STATUS:
The populations of the Azure-winged Magpies tend to become very local and do not increase. The disturbances caused by human close to the nests do not favour the broods’ success.
Fr: Pie bleue
All: Blauelster
Esp: Urraca de Rabo Largo
Ital: Gazza aliazzurre
Nd: Blauwe Ekster
Russe: Голубая сорока
Sd: Blåskata
Text and photographs by Nicole Bouglouan
Sources :
THE HANDBOOK OF BIRD IDENTIFICATION FOR EUROPE AND THE WESTERN PALEARCTIC by Mark Beaman, Steve Madge - C.Helm - ISBN: 0713639601
L’ENCYCLOPEDIE MONDIALE DES OISEAUX - Dr Christopher M. Perrins - BORDAS - ISBN: 2040185607
Pájaros de España (JL Beamonte)
Wikipedia (Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia)
SORA Searchable Ornithological Research Archive (Blair O. Wolf)
Welcome to WhoZoo (Jill Foley)
