Talk:Purple roller

Latest comment: 1 year ago by Adam Cuerden in topic Featured picture scheduled for POTD

Featured picture scheduled for POTD edit

Hello! This is to let editors know that File:Purple roller (Coracias naevius mosambicus).jpg, a featured picture used in this article, has been selected as the English Wikipedia's picture of the day (POTD) for October 17, 2022. A preview of the POTD is displayed below and can be edited at Template:POTD/2022-10-17. For the greater benefit of readers, any potential improvements or maintenance that could benefit the quality of this article should be done before its scheduled appearance on the Main Page. If you have any concerns, please place a message at Wikipedia talk:Picture of the day. Thank you! Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 7.9% of all FPs 11:28, 1 June 2022 (UTC)Reply

 

The purple roller (Coracias naevius), also known as the rufous-crowned roller, is a medium-sized species of bird in the family Coraciidae widespread in sub-Saharan Africa. Compared with other rollers its colours are rather dull and its voice rather harsh and grating. Its preferred habitat is dry thornveld, where it spends long periods perched at the top of thorn trees or poles, watching for food items such as insects, spiders, scorpions and small lizards on the ground. It rocks to-and-fro about its longitudinal axis during display flights, calling raucously all the while; starting from above the treetops it plummets towards the ground in rolling flight. The species is territorial, and during the breeding season it will drive off other rollers, small hawks, and crows. This purple roller, of the subspecies C. n. mosambicus, was photographed in Etosha National Park, Namibia.

Photograph credit: Charles J. Sharp