Bird eggs are laid by the females and range in quantity from one (as in condors ) to up to seventeen (the grey partridge ). Clutch size may vary latitudinally within a species. Some birds lay eggs even when the eggs have not been fertilized; it is not uncommon for pet owners to find their lone bird nesting on a clutch of infertile eggs, which are sometimes called wind-eggs.
53-535: See text The woodlark or wood lark ( Lullula arborea ) is the only extant species in the lark genus Lullula . It is found across most of Europe, the Middle East, western Asia and the mountains of north Africa. It is mainly resident (non- migratory ) in the west of its range, but eastern populations of this passerine bird are more migratory, moving further south in winter. There are two subspecies of woodlark, L. a. arborea and L. a. pallida . The former
106-727: A lu-lu-lu- or, more precisely, as a "serial lū-lū-lū-lū-lū- ", toolooeet toolooeet toolooeet . Found mainly in Europe, the mountains of northern Africa and western Asia, the woodlark is present across much of its range. In Europe, the bird seems most at home in the sandy heaths of Belgium, where its density was 7.5 pairs per square kilometre (km) in 1988. In the same year, densities in East Germany ranged from 0.29 to 5.0 pairs per km and between 0.1 and 0.25 pairs per km in southern England , with more optimal habitats being more densely populated. However, populations fluctuated across Europe in
159-506: A salver of toasted larks" during the reception following newborn Titus 's christening. Canadian poet John McCrae mentions larks in his poem " In Flanders Fields ". English composer Ralph Vaughan Williams wrote a musical setting of George Meredith's poem, completed in 1914. It was composed for violin and piano, and entitled The Lark Ascending - A Romance . The work received its first performance in December 1920. Soon afterwards
212-414: A further 11 to 13 days. Families stay together for the summer and into the autumn. Two, sometimes three broods will be raised each year. As with many of the birds in the lark family, the woodlark is primarily vegetarian as an adult but during the breeding season will also eat medium-sized insects. The diet is mainly composed of seeds and such insects as beetles, flies and moths. During the breeding season,
265-514: A lark. Traditionally, larks are kept as pets in China. In Beijing, larks are taught to mimic the voice of other songbirds and animals. It is an old-fashioned habit of the Beijingers to teach their larks 13 kinds of sounds in a strict order (called "the 13 songs of a lark", Chinese: 百灵十三套). The larks that can sing the full 13 sounds in the correct order are highly valued, while any disruption in
318-458: A long history of both eating wild bird eggs and raising birds for farmed eggs for consumption. Brood parasitism occurs in birds when one species lays its eggs in the nest of another. In some cases, the host's eggs are removed or eaten by the female, or expelled by her chick. Brood parasites include cowbirds , honeyguides , and many Old World cuckoos . Today, the hard shells of bird eggs are unique among animals. However, this trait evolved in
371-721: A number of dishes; for example, they can be stewed, broiled, or used as filling in a meat pie. Lark's tongues are reputed to have been particularly highly valued as a delicacy. In modern times, shrinking habitats made lark meat rare and hard to come by, though it can still be found in restaurants in Italy and elsewhere in southern Europe. The lark in mythology and literature stands for daybreak, as in Chaucer 's " The Knight's Tale ", "the bisy larke, messager of day", and Shakespeare 's Sonnet 29 , "the lark at break of day arising / From sullen earth, sings hymns at heaven's gate" (11–12). The lark
424-526: A pair were recorded on a main road near Putney Heath , London . The male woodlark has a song flight similar to that of the Eurasian skylark but flutters more as he rises and spirals upwards, circling the ground as he sings at a fairly constant height. Both male and female birds will also sing from the ground or a perch. Birds start singing early in the season, usually around February in Britain. The nest
477-455: A willingness to expand into anthropogenic habitats—as long as these are not too intensively managed—have ensured larks a prominent place in literature and music, especially the Eurasian skylark in northern Europe and the crested lark and calandra lark in southern Europe. Male larks use song flights to defend their breeding territory and attract a mate. Most species build nests on the ground, usually cups of dead grass, but in some species
530-421: Is onomatopoeic from French “Lulu”, the name given to the bird by de Buffon . The French name, Alouette lulu , and the scientific name , Lullula arborea , are derived from the sound of its song. The specific arborea is from Latin arbor, arboris , "tree". There are two subspecies of woodlark: This is a 13.5- to 15-cm-long bird, slightly smaller than the skylark being roughly 20% shorter. The woodlark
583-517: Is a lack of that mineral. In species such as the common guillemot , which nest in large groups, each female's eggs have very different markings, making it easier for females to identify their own eggs on the crowded cliff ledges on which they breed. Bird eggshells are diverse. For example: Tiny pores in a bird eggshell allow the embryo to breathe. The domestic hen 's egg has around 7500 pores. The shape of eggs varies considerably across bird species, ranging from near-spherical (such as those of
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#1732765189875636-536: Is a product of flight adaptations and not the outcome of nesting conditions or a bird's life history. A strong correlation was found between egg shape and flight ability on broad taxonomic scales, such that birds engaging in high powered flights usually maximize egg size by having elliptical shaped eggs while maintaining a streamlined body plan. Selection acting during incubation, such as breeding site and incubation posture, are also thought to influence egg-shape variation across birds. Egg size tends to be proportional to
689-609: Is also (often simultaneously) associated with "lovers and lovers' observance" (as in Bernart de Ventadorn 's Can vei la lauzeta mover ) and with "church services". These meanings of daybreak and religious reference can be combined, as in Blake 's Visions of the Daughters of Albion , into a "spiritual daybreak" to signify "passage from Earth to Heaven and from Heaven to Earth". With Renaissance painters such as Domenico Ghirlandaio ,
742-405: Is generally made from grass, bracken, roots and moss and constructed in a depression on the ground. Nesting starts early, sometimes with the first eggs laid before end of March. Usually between three and five eggs are laid. The female will incubate the eggs, which are whitish with brown speckles, for 13 to 15 days. Both parents will then feed the young in the nest and the chicks leave the nest after
795-453: Is important to quantify this pigmentation For the same reason, later eggs in a clutch are more spotted than early ones, as the female's store of calcium is depleted. Birds which build in trees generally have blue or greenish eggs, either spotted or unspotted, while birds that build in bushes or near or on the ground are likely to lay speckled eggs. The color of individual eggs is also genetically influenced, and appears to be inherited through
848-448: Is mainly brown above and pale below, but with a distinctive white superciliar meeting on the nape. It has a crest which is quite small and at most times inconspicuous. In flight it shows a short tail and short broad wings. The tail is tipped with white, but unlike the skylark, the tail sides and the rear edge of the wings are not edged with white. A songbird , the woodlark has a melodious, warbling song often described onomatopoeically as
901-476: Is mainly resident in the west, with eastern populations migrating south in the winter. The woodlark's natural habitat is heathland and open spaces sparsely populated with trees. They prefer clearings in pine forests and heathland and like newly planted areas with pine saplings. Experimental work showed that annual ground‐disturbance can increase Woodlark abundance within lowland grass‐heaths. The bird can also be found more rarely in urban areas. For example, in 1950
954-411: Is native to northern regions of Europe, while the latter can be found in the south of the woodlark's range. Their diet is mostly composed of seeds but also includes insects during the breeding period. A comparatively small bird, the woodlark is between 13.5 and 15 centimetres long and roughly 20% shorter than the skylark . It is a brown bird with a pale underside and has a white-tipped tail. The woodlark
1007-421: Is necessary, and some parasitic cuckoos , which lay eggs that often closely match the passerine host's egg. To varying degrees of success, host passerine species have combined speckles, blotches and other egg markings with visual pattern-recognition abilities to help them reject cuckoos' counterfeit eggs. Most other passerines, in contrast, lay colored eggs, even if there is no need of cryptic colors. However,
1060-535: Is usually within a small range of variation. Some birds respond to the accidental loss of eggs by laying a replacement egg. Others will stop laying based on the apparent size of the clutch. According to whether they respond to addition, removal, or both addition and removal of eggs, birds are classified as determinate layers (number of eggs laid is predetermined and do not respond to change) or as indeterminate layers. In general, birds with small clutch size tended to be indeterminate. Many animals feed on eggs. For example,
1113-707: The Handbook of the Birds of the World , adhere to that placement. However, many other classifications follow the Sibley-Ahlquist taxonomy in placing the larks in a large oscine subgroup Passerida (which excludes crows , shrikes and their allies, vireos , and many groups characteristic of Australia and southeastern Asia). For instance, the American Ornithologists' Union places larks just after
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#17327651898751166-738: The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species as being of least concern , meaning that it is not currently threatened with extinction. Lark see text Larks are passerine birds of the family Alaudidae . Larks have a cosmopolitan distribution with the largest number of species occurring in Africa. Only a single species, the horned lark , occurs in North America, and only Horsfield's bush lark occurs in Australia. Habitats vary widely, but many species live in dry regions. When
1219-1512: The International Ornithological Committee (IOC): the rusty bush lark ( Mirafra rufa ) and Gillett's lark ( Mirafra gilletti ) were found to be embedded in the genus Calendulauda . Alström and collaborators proposed that the genus Mirafra should be split into four genera: Mirafra , Plocealauda , Amirafra and Corypha . Alaemon – hoopoe-larks (2 species) Ammomanopsis – Gray's lark Chersomanes – larks (2 species) Certhilauda – long-billed larks (6 species) Eremopterix – sparrow-larks (8 species) Pinarocorys – larks (2 species) Ramphocoris – thick-billed lark Ammomanes – larks (3 species) Calendulauda – larks (8 species) Heteromirafra – larks (2 species) Mirafra – larks (7 species) Plocealauda – bush larks (5 species) Amirafra – larks (3 species) Corypha – larks (11 species) Lullula – woodlark Spizocorys – larks (7 species) Alauda – skylarks (4 species) Galerida – larks (7 species) Eremophila – horned larks (2 species) Calandrella – short-toed larks (6 species) Melanocorypha – larks (5 species) Chersophilus – Dupont's lark Eremalauda – larks (2 species) Alaudala – short-toed larks (6 species) The family Alaudidae contains 102 extant species which are divided into 24 genera : For more detail, see list of lark species . Larks, or
1272-502: The calcium carbonate from which the shells are made, but some birds, mainly passerines , produce colored eggs. The pigments biliverdin and its zinc chelate give a green or blue ground color, and protoporphyrin produces reds and browns as a ground color or as spotting. Non-passerines typically have white eggs, except in some ground-nesting groups, such as the Charadriiformes , sandgrouse and nightjars , where camouflage
1325-422: The little bee-eater ) to highly pyriform or conical (such as those of the common murre ) with the familiar shape of the chicken egg lying in between. Early scientific investigators of egg shape suggested that the oval shape of eggs was caused by the egg being forced through the oviduct by peristalsis . In this often-repeated but incorrect theory of egg shape formation, the contraction and relaxation of
1378-404: The tarsus (the lowest leg bone, connected to the toes) has only one set of scales on the rear surface, which is rounded. Pipits and all other songbirds have two plates of scales on the rear surface, which meet at a protruding rear edge. Larks have more elaborate calls than most birds, and often extravagant songs given in display flight. These melodious sounds (to human ears), combined with
1431-578: The 1990s and 2000s and more up-to-date density figures are unavailable. The extent of the woodlark's range is England in the west, parts of northern Egypt to the south, Iran and Turkmenistan to the east and the Scandinavian Peninsula in the north. Declining populations have resulted in the woodlark's range contracting, for example in Britain it once bred in Wales and central England but is now found only in southern England. Within its range it
1484-465: The big end tipped upward. The big end contains the air sac and its shell is pierced by a higher density of pores than the more pointed end. Tipping the big end upwards improves oxygen flow to the large head, with the physiologically demanding eyes and brain, that develops in the big end while the tail develops at the more pointed end. In a 2017 publication in the journal Science , mathematical modeling of 50,000 bird eggs data showed that bird egg shape
1537-456: The bird and was in fact writing about the tree pipit , which was commonly referred to as the woodlark in Scotland. The woodlark's song is also thought to be melodious while Burns' poem has an "underlying sense of grief" which may be attributed to the languishing notes at the end of the tree pipit's song. However, the woodlark has been spotted in Scotland on occasion and it is possible that Burns
1590-422: The bird oviduct, see here ). However, this theory has been refuted by studies of egg shell formation in a number of bird species using techniques such as X-ray photography which have demonstrated that egg shape is determined in the oviduct isthmus (before shell calcification) with the pointed end caudal (furthest down the oviduct). These observations cannot be explained by peristalsis. It has been proposed that
1643-673: The breeding population of woodlarks was estimated to number 1.3 million to 3.3 million breeding pairs. Europe accounts for 75-94% of the global population, meaning between 4.15 million and 13.2 million individuals in its world range. Populations of woodlark have fluctuated across Europe, with specific figures available for Britain showing these fluctuations. An estimated 400 breeding pairs were present in England in 1981. A series of systematic national surveys found 241 pairs in 1986, which increased to 1633 pairs in 1997 followed by an 88% increase to 3064 pairs in 2007. The woodlark has been categorised by
Woodlark - Misplaced Pages Continue
1696-607: The composer arranged it for violin and orchestra, in which version it was first performed in June 1921, and this is how the work remains best-known today. The old Welsh folk song Marwnad yr Ehedydd (The Lark's Elegy) refers to the death of "the Lark", possibly as a coded reference to the Welsh leader Owain Glyndŵr . The French-Canadian folk song Alouette refers to plucking feathers from
1749-526: The crows, shrikes, and vireos. At a finer level of detail, some now place the larks at the beginning of a superfamily Sylvioidea with the swallows, various " Old World warbler " and " babbler " groups, and others . Molecular phylogenetic studies have shown that within the Sylvioidea the larks form a sister clade to the family Panuridae which contains a single species, the bearded reedling ( Panurus biarmicus ). The phylogeny of larks (Alaudidae)
1802-525: The egg acquires its shape (with the pointed egg caudal) as it is forced through the narrow isthmus, but this assertion has not been thoroughly verified. Cliff-nesting birds often have highly conical eggs. They are less likely to roll off, tending instead to roll around in a tight circle; this trait is likely to have arisen due to evolution via natural selection. In contrast, many hole-nesting birds have nearly spherical eggs. The shape has biological significance. A pointed egg will tend to sit on its side, with
1855-775: The family Alaudidae, are small- to medium-sized birds, 12 to 24 cm (4.7 to 9.4 in) in length and 15 to 75 g (0.5 to 2.6 oz) in mass. The smallest larks are likely the Spizocorys species, which can weigh only around 14 g (0.49 oz) in species like the pink-billed lark and the Obbia lark , while the largest lark is the Tibetan lark . Like many ground birds, most lark species have long hind claws, which are thought to provide stability while standing. Most have streaked brown plumage, some boldly marked with black or white. Their dull appearance camouflages them on
1908-480: The female incubates the eggs in spells of approximately 45 minutes and intervals of eight minutes feeding. Populations of woodlark across Europe have been in decline and ranges have been contracting in recent years. Habitat loss is thought to be a major contributor to this, with dry grassland, fallow land, lowland heathland and pasture being lost to agriculture, abandonment and development across Northern Europe. Recent wildfires in England are also thought to have damaged
1961-461: The ground, especially when on the nest. They feed on insects and seeds ; though adults of most species eat seeds primarily, all species feed their young insects for at least the first week after hatching. Many species dig with their bills to uncover food. Some larks have heavy bills (reaching an extreme in the thick-billed lark ) for cracking seeds open, while others have long, down-curved bills, which are especially suitable for digging. Larks are
2014-466: The lark symbolizes Christ , with reference to John 16:16. Percy Bysshe Shelley's famed 1820 poem " To a Skylark " was inspired by the melodious song of a skylark during an evening walk. English poet George Meredith wrote a poem titled " The Lark Ascending " in 1881. In Mervyn Peake 's Titus Groan , first book of the Gormenghast trilogy , "Swelter approache[s] [ Lord Sepulchrave ] with
2067-617: The little wóodlark. "The Woodlark" by Gerard Manley Hopkins The woodlark is commemorated in the works of two major poets. "The Woodlark", written by Gerard Manley Hopkins , departs from the standard tradition of British nature poetry by trying to transliterate the bird's song into made-up words. The Scottish poet Robert Burns wrote of the bird's "melting art" in his poem "To the Woodlark". As there are currently no woodlarks in Scotland, and Burns never travelled south of Carlisle, many have speculated that Burns never came in contact with
2120-408: The mother only, suggesting the gene responsible for pigmentation is on the female-specific W chromosome (female birds are WZ, males are ZZ). Color was once thought to be applied to the shell immediately before laying, but this research shows coloration is an integral part of the development of the shell, with the same protein responsible for depositing calcium carbonate, or protoporphyrins when there
2173-401: The muscles which push the egg down the oviduct cause the spherical egg membrane to distort slightly into an ovoid shape, with the blunt end caudal (i.e. furthest down the oviduct and closest to the cloaca ). The calcification of the egg in the shell gland/ uterus then fixes it in this shape, and the egg is laid with the blunt end appearing first (for a diagram showing the different sections of
Woodlark - Misplaced Pages Continue
2226-512: The nests are more complicated and partly domed. A few desert species nest very low in bushes, perhaps so circulating air can cool the nest. Larks' eggs are usually speckled. The size of the clutch is very variable and ranges from the single egg laid by Sclater's lark up to 6–8 eggs laid by the calandra lark and the black lark . Larks incubate for 11 to 16 days. Larks, commonly consumed with bones intact, have historically been considered wholesome, delicate, and light game. They can be used in
2279-463: The only passerines that lose all their feathers in their first moult (in all species whose first moult is known). This may result from the poor quality of the chicks' feathers, which in turn may result from the benefits to the parents of switching the young to a lower-quality diet (seeds), which requires less work from the parents. In many respects, including long tertial feathers , larks resemble other ground birds such as pipits . However, in larks
2332-444: The photographic markings on passerine eggs have been suggested to reduce brittleness by acting as a solid state lubricant. If insufficient calcium is available in the local soil, the egg shell may be thin, especially in a circle around the broad end. Protoporphyrin speckling compensates for this, and increases inversely to the amount of calcium in the soil. To understand the functional significance of eggshell spotting (or maculation) it
2385-420: The population, with some protected woodlark habitats having been destroyed. Teevo cheevo cheevio chee : O where, what can tháat be? Weedio-weedio : there again! So tiny a trickle of sóng-strain; And all round not to be found For brier, bough, furrow, or gréen ground Before or behind or far or at hand Either left either right Anywhere in the súnlight. Well, after all! Ah but hark— ‘I am
2438-455: The principal predators of the black oystercatcher 's eggs include raccoons , skunks , mink , river and sea otters , gulls , crows and foxes . The stoat ( Mustela erminea ) and long-tailed weasel ( Neogale frenata ) steal ducks' eggs. Ostrich eggs are vulnerable to many predators ranging from mongooses and Egyptian vultures , to hyenas . Snakes of the genera Dasypeltis and Elachistodon specialize in eating eggs. Humans have
2491-581: The single plate found in most songbirds . They also lack a pessulus , the bony central structure in the syrinx of songbirds . They were long placed at or near the beginning of the songbirds or oscines (now often called Passeri ), just after the suboscines and before the swallows , for example in the American Ornithologists' Union 's first check-list. Some authorities, such as the British Ornithologists' Union and
2544-420: The size of the adult bird, from the half gram egg of the bee hummingbird to the 1.5 kg egg of the ostrich . Kiwis have disproportionately large eggs, up to 20% of the female's body weight. This evolutionary trait results in kiwi chicks that can emerge from the nest days after hatching, ready to start foraging for food. The number of eggs laid in a single brood is referred to as the clutch. Clutch size
2597-408: The songs will decrease their value significantly. Larks sing early in the day, often before dawn, leading to the expression "up with the lark" for a person who is awake early in the day, and the term lark being applied to someone who habitually rises early in the morning. Bird egg All bird eggs contain the following components: The default color of vertebrate eggs is the white of
2650-479: The word "lark" is used without specification, it often refers to the Eurasian skylark (Alauda arvensis) . The family Alaudidae was introduced in 1825 by the Irish zoologist Nicholas Aylward Vigors as a subfamily Alaudina of the finch family Fringillidae . Larks are a well-defined family, partly because of the shape of their tarsus . They have multiple scutes on the hind side of their tarsi, rather than
2703-615: Was described by the Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus in 1758 in the tenth edition of his Systema Naturae and given the binomial name Alauda arborea . This binomial name is identical to the Latin name used in 1676 by English ornithologist Francis Willughby in his Ornithologiae libri tres . The woodlark is now placed in the genus Lullula that was introduced by the German naturalist Johann Jakob Kaup in 1829. The current genus name
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#17327651898752756-481: Was reviewed in 2013, leading to the recognition of the arrangement below. The genus level cladogram shown below is based on a molecular phylogenetic study of the larks by Per Alström and collaborators published in 2023. The subfamilies are those proposed by the authors. For two species the results conflict with the taxonomy published online in July 2023 by Frank Gill , Pamela Rasmussen and David Donsker on behalf of
2809-584: Was writing about this bird. This is backed up by the entry of a minister from Clinic, Perthshire in the Old Statistical Account , which reads "The notes of the wood-lark are heard, delightful along the banks of the Lunan in spring and autumn; its nocturnal song has a dying cadence peculiarly melodious and has often been mistaken for the song of the Philomel [nightingale]." In Europe in 2004,
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