Fujairah’s Fauna: The Little Green Bee-eaters
This is an abundant and fairly tame bird, familiar throughout its range. It is a bird which breeds in open country with bushes. In Africa and Arabia it is found in arid areas, but is more diverse in its habitats further east. This species often hunts from low perches, maybe only a metre or less high.
This species, like other bee-eaters, is a richly colored, slender bird. It always has green upper parts, but the head and underpart colors vary widely depending on the race. Thus, southeast Asian birds have rufous crown and face, and green underparts, whereas Arabian breeders have a green crown, blue face and bluish underparts. The wings are green and the beak is black. It reaches a length of 16-18 cm, including the two elongated central tail feathers. These elongated tail feathers are absent in juveniles. Sexes are alike.
Special Skill: A study showed that Little Green Bee-eaters are capable of putting themselves in the place of other animals. They were able to predict whether a predator at a particular location would be capable of spotting their nest entrance and behaving appropriately. The ability to look from another’s point of view was usually believed to be possessed only by the primates.
BREEDING / NESTING
Unlike most bee-eaters, these are often solitary nesters, making a tunnel in sandy banks. They nest in hollows in vertical mud banks. The nest tunnel that they construct can run as much as 5 feet long and the 3-5 eggs are laid on the bare ground in the cavity at the end of the tunnel. The breeding pairs are often joined by helpers.
They sometimes form small colonies, or nest near other bee-eaters. They lay 4 to 8 spherical and glossy white eggs. Both the male and the female take care of the eggs.
