![]() ![]() ![]() ⤷ Buff-spotted flameback of Bohol, Leyte, Samar, Biliran, Panaon, Mindando, Basilan and Samal Philippine Islands ⤷ Yellow-faced flameback of Negros, Guimaras, Panay, Masbate and Ticao Philippine Islands ⤷ Luzon flameback of Luzon, Polillo, Catanduanes and Marinduque in the northern Philippines ⤷ Javan flameback of eastern Java, and Bali and Kangean Islands ⤷ Crimson-backed flameback, of Sri Lanka. Recent taxonomic evidence suggests the species be split into the following species: Widely distributed and quite common in parts of its range, the Greater Fireback is classified as a Species of Least Concern by the IUCN. They nest in tree holes, laying three or four white eggs. The long tongue can be darted forward to extract wood-boring arthropod prey while mainly feeding on small invertebrates, greater flamebacks will also drink nectar. Like other woodpeckers, the greater flameback uses its bill to dig out food from trees and its zygodactyl feet and stiff tail to provide support against tree trunks. ![]() In Malaysian mangrove forest for example, the greater flameback has been found to prefer tall "Avicennia alba" for foraging, while the common flameback rather indiscriminately utilizes that species as well as "Bruguiera parviflora" and "Sonneratia alba". lucidus" may be more or less common than "D. It seems to be well-adapted to particular forest types, while the similar-looking common flameback is more of a generalist thus, depending on what forests predominate in a region, "C. This flameback is a species associated with a diversity of rather open forest habitat, such as found in the foothills of the Himalayas or in the Western Ghats it also inhabits mangrove forest. While the similar plumage may be due to sheer chance – perhaps as an atavism of plesiomorphic patterns – the facts that such cases are commonplace in the Picinae and that the species involved are usually sympatric suggests that there may well be some as yet undiscovered benefit to either or all of the taxa involved. In all of these cases, these birds are neither gregarious nor known to be bad-tasting, and due to their size difference and habitat preferences do not compete much hence the usual reasons for mimicry do not seem to apply. Those flamebacks are also smaller, have a bill that is shorter than the head, and dark irises.Ĭonvergent evolution in plumage between a larger and a smaller species is also found among other woodpeckers, such as the North American downy woodpecker and hairy woodpecker, the tropical American smoky-brown woodpecker and certain "Veniliornis" species, or the striped woodpecker and checkered woodpecker and some South American "Piculus" and ""Picoides"". Unlike the black-rumped flameback and the common flameback, the greater flameback's dark moustache stripes are divided by white except in "stricklandi", their hindneck is white, and even in the Sri Lankan birds the dark colour does not extend to between the shoulders as it does in "Dinopium" consequently, when seen from behind the black-and-white-headed greater flamebacks outside Sri Lanka show a white neck bordered with black on the sides, while the "Dinopium" species have a black neck and upper back, with thin white borders to the neck. White-and-black-headed greater flameback subspecies resemble some of the three-toed "Dinopium" flamebacks, but are not particularly closely related.
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