Leafbirds: Family Chloropseidae

Leafbirds are a small family of colorful passerines native to southeastern Asia. The bright plumage these birds exhibit helps them to blend in with... wait for it... leaves! Most leafbirds live in the mid-canopy, where the bright leaves and flowers provide excellent camouflage. Most members of this family are bright green with a dark bibs, but several are bright yellow and red as well. Their beautiful colors and beautiful liquid song make these birds a double threat in the bird world, and many have been kept as cage birds. If, however, they are not kept well, or if these birds feel stressed out, they will shed most of their feathers. This adaptation may play a role in confusing predators in the wild, but makes for a really ugly caged bird!

What do they do?

Members of this family generally spend most of their time up in the canopy of trees, trying to find delicious bugs to eat. Leafbirds have a long sharp beak that curves down slightly and a brush tipped tongue to help them pull insects from the bark and leaves of trees. What a life. While their diet is mostly made up of insects, they do eat fruit and nectar as well. Most of the time a leafbird will swallow a piece of fruit whole, but if it can't, they pierce the fruit with their beak and let the juices leak into their mouth, yum!

Birds that feed off of nectar help plants to spread their pollen to other flowers. Because these birds are able to hover for brief periods, they will often take nectar from many flowers on the same tree. When they move from one flower to another, bits of pollen get stuck to the feathers on their face. After they move to the next flower, the pollen is deposited on that flower, which is then able to produce seeds and fruit. Other animals then eat the fruit, and poop out the seeds, which allows that plant to reproduce. Nature is just full of interconnectivity!

Taxonomy

Leafbirds are a small family of birds and only contain 1 genera and 10 species. They are closely related to bulbuls and drongos and ioras. The Ioras used to be considered a genus within the leafbird family until DNA evidence told a different story. Genera include:

Genus Chloropsis