Friday, January 22, 2010

Yellow-fronted Barbet




The Yellow-fronted Barbet is an endemic bird found in the well wooded area in the wet lowlands and mid hills of Sri Lanka. More info and images after the jump.



This is the second largest Barbet found on the Island (the Brown-headed Barbet is the largest). It is unmistakeable with its yellow forehead and blue face. It frequents tall trees but descends to lower branches, especially when these are in fruit. It mainly feeds on fruit but is known to occasionally eat insects as well.


The breeding season is during February and May with a secondary season form August to September. The nest hole is similar to that of the Brown-headed Barbet but is slightly smaller in size. The cavity is oval in shape and, if new, is 8 inches in depth. The Yellow-fronted barbet uses its nest for several years running, digging it deeper each year.


I came across this bird at our place in Kandy where it was seen feeding on these flowers at around 7.00 am every morning. Getting the shots above wasn't hard. All I had to do was make sure I was around at the correct time. To capture these images I increased the ISO to 640 with the hope of getting a faster shutter speed. In hind sight, I should have used an ISO of 400 and a bit of fill flash. This would have reduced the noise. Something to keep in mind for next time....


Other images / info on Barbets


No comments:

Post a Comment

My Ping in TotalPing.com
Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...
Get Paid To Promote, Get Paid To Popup, Get Paid Display Banner