Black-necked Stork

About the Black-necked Stork

The black-necked stork (Ephippiorhynchus asiaticus) is a tall, long-necked wading bird in the stork family. It is a resident species across the Indian subcontinent and Southeast Asia with a disjunct population in Australia. It lives in wetland habitats and near fields of certain crops such as rice and wheat where it forages for a wide range of animal prey. Adult birds of both sexes have a heavy bill and are patterned in white and irridescent blacks, but the sexes differ in the colour of the iris with females sporting yellow irises and males having dark-coloured irises. In Australia, it is known as a jabiru, although that name also refers to a stork species found in the Americas. It is one of the few storks that are strongly territorial when feeding and breeding.

First described by John Latham as Mycteria asiatica, this species was later placed in the now-defunct genus Xenorhynchus based on morphology. Based on behavioural similarities, M. Philip Kahl suggested the placement of the species in the genus Ephippiorhynchus, which then included a single species, the saddle-billed stork. This placement of both the black-necked stork and saddle-billed stork in... Wikipedia →