Greater Honeyguide - Reproduction

Reproduction

In addition to being a predator of insects and a mutualist with its follower species, the Greater Honeyguide is a brood parasite. It lays white eggs in series of 3 to 7, for a total of 10 to 20 in a year. Each egg is laid in a different nest of a bird of another species, including some woodpeckers, barbets, kingfishers, bee-eaters, woodhoopoes, starlings, and large swallows. All the species parasitized nest in holes, covered nests, or deep cup nests. The chick has a membranous hook on the bill that it uses, while still blind and featherless, to kill the host's young outright or by repeated wounds.

Read more about this topic:  Greater Honeyguide

Famous quotes containing the word reproduction:

    Were I called on to define, very briefly, the term Art, I should call it “the reproduction of what the Senses perceive in Nature through the veil of the soul.” The mere imitation, however accurate, of what is in Nature, entitles no man to the sacred name of “Artist.”
    Edgar Allan Poe (1809–1845)

    The atmosphere parents wish to create when talking with children about birth and reproduction is warm, honest, and reassuring, one that tells children they are free to ask questions as often as they need to, and you will answer them as lovingly as you know how.
    Joanna Cole (20th century)

    An original is a creation
    motivated by desire.
    Any reproduction of an original
    is motivated by necessity ...
    It is marvelous that we are
    the only species that creates
    gratuitous forms.
    To create is divine, to reproduce
    is human.
    Man Ray (1890–1976)