Profile
In flight
Clever Corvids
Red-billed Chough
Pyrrhocorax pyrrhocorax
- epic
- 72 km/h
- Least Concern
Sea-cliff and mountain crow with a curved scarlet bill. Acrobatic flier that delivers in updrafts.
- Population
- European population estimated at roughly 86,000–210,000 individuals (12,265–17,370 breeding pairs, per BirdLife-sourced Wikipedia figures); no reliable GLOBAL population total could be located in accessible sources (BirdLife DataZone's own population tables would not render via WebFetch or the r.jina.ai reader-proxy, and the candidate IUCN Red List page for this species, 22705915/223796444, returned 404). The species' range is described as extensive (~10 million km²) and the population as not globally threatened.
- Habitat
- High mountains (typically 2,000–3,000 m), sea cliffs and coastal grassland, and short-grazed pasture (e.g., grazed by sheep and rabbits)
- Fun fact
- Red-billed choughs are distinguished from other corvids by their long, curved red bill and red legs, and form strong lifelong pair bonds; they are the bird of Cornish legend, said to carry the soul of King Arthur after his final battle (with the bird's red bill and legs explained as stained by his blood), and were later retrospectively adopted into the attributed coat of arms of Thomas Becket.
- Range
- Widely but patchily distributed across western Europe (Ireland, western Britain, Brittany), the Mediterranean basin and southern Europe, North Africa, the Middle East, Central Asia, the Himalayas (India, China), with an isolated population in the Ethiopian highlands (independently corroborated by Cornell Birds of the World); largely resident/non-migratory
- Diet
- Mainly ground-foraged invertebrates (ants considered especially significant, plus other insects, spiders and larvae), supplemented with seeds, grain, and other plant material
- Size
- 0.395 m
- Wingspan
- 0.815 m
- Lifespan
- 17 years
