Green Wood Hoopoe Identification Guide

Key Field Marks

• Size and shape: A slender, long-tailed bird about 13.5 inches long, with a notably long, downcurved, bright red bill and a long, graduated tail.
• Plumage: Overall glossy, iridescent dark green to blue-green plumage, appearing almost black in poor light but flashing bright metallic green and purple in good sun; white spots are visible on the wings in flight, and the outer tail feathers show white tips and bands.
• Bill and legs: Long, thin, strongly downcurved red bill (juveniles have a duller, blackish bill that reddens with age); short red legs.
• Behavior: Highly social, moving in noisy family groups of half a dozen or more through trees, probing bark crevices and dead wood with the long bill for insects; frequently clings sideways or upside-down on trunks and branches like a woodpecker or nuthatch.

Separating It From Similar Species

• Violet Wood Hoopoe and other Phoeniculus species (where ranges overlap): Similar in shape, but Green Wood Hoopoe shows a more uniformly green (rather than strongly violet or blue-tinged) gloss and is best separated by range and, at close range, subtle color differences in good light.
• Common Hoopoe: Unrelated in appearance despite the similar name; Common Hoopoe has a striking pink-and-black-and-white pattern, a fan-like crest, and a shorter, straighter bill, quite unlike the glossy dark green, long red-billed Wood Hoopoe.
• Scimitarbills: Smaller, with a thinner, more strongly curved black bill and lacking the bold white wing and tail markings of Green Wood Hoopoe.
• The combination of loud, cackling group calls and a family party moving together through the canopy is itself a strong identification clue.

Where and When to See It

• Habitat: Open woodland, savanna, riverine forest, and wooded gardens with large trees offering bark crevices and dead wood for foraging.
• Range: Widespread across sub-Saharan Africa, from East Africa south through much of southern Africa.
• Season: A non-migratory resident, present and active year-round, often most conspicuous in the early morning when family groups forage and call together.

Voice and Song Cues

• Extremely vocal, giving a loud, raucous, cackling "kek-kek-kek-kek" chorus as a group, often rising and falling in a chattering cacophony that is one of the most distinctive sounds of African woodland.
• Also gives softer, harsher single notes when foraging alone or communicating within the group at close range.