 | This articleneeds additional citations forverification. Please helpimprove this article byadding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Find sources: "Empress of Germany's bird of paradise" – news ·newspapers ·books ·scholar ·JSTOR(August 2015) (Learn how and when to remove this message) |
| Empress of Germany's bird of paradise | |
|---|---|
 | |
Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Aves |
| Order: | Passeriformes |
| Family: | Paradisaeidae |
| Genus: | Paradisaea |
| Species: | |
| Subspecies: | P. r. augustavictoriae |
| Trinomial name | |
| Paradisaea raggiana augustavictoriae Cabanis, 1888 | |
TheEmpress of Germany's bird of paradise,Paradisaea raggiana augustavictoriae, is a large (up to 34-cm-long) maroon brown bird in the familyParadisaeidae, one of three families of birds known as birds of paradise. The male has a dark emerald green throat, yellow crown, pale brown below and narrow yellow throat collar. It closely resembles the crimson-plumedRaggiana bird-of-paradise, but has apricot orange rather than crimson flank plumes. The female is an overall brown bird with yellow head and dark brown face.
The Empress of Germany's bird of paradise is distributed andendemic to the upperRamu River andHuon Peninsula of northeasternPapua New Guinea. The male ispolygamous and displays in communal lek. The diet consists mainly of fruits, insects andarthropods.
One of the most heavily hunted birds of paradise in theplume hunting era, the Empress of Germany's bird of paradise was the first bird of paradise to breed in captivity. It was bred by PrinceR. S. Dharmakumarsinhji ofIndia in 1940.[1]
The name commemorates theGerman Empress andqueen consort of Prussia,Augusta Victoria of Schleswig-Holstein.
In the wild, the Empress of Germany's bird of paradise is hybridized with theemperor bird-of-paradise, with at least six specimens known. Thought to be a new species, thehybrid was namedMaria's bird-of-paradise,Paradisaea maria orFrau Reichenow's bird-of-paradise.
 | ThisParadisaeidae-related article is astub. You can help Wikipedia byadding missing information. |
