Blue-capped Ifrita
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| Ifrita kowaldi De Vis, 1890 |
The Blue-capped Ifrita, Ifrita kowaldi also known as Ifrit is a small olive brown cinclosomatid bird found in mountain forests of New Guinea. It measures up to 16.5cm long with blue-capped black crown and yellowish brown below. Male has white streak behind its eye, while female's ochraceous.
This enigmatic poisonous bird, along with Hooded Pitohui, is known to sequester Batrachotoxin in its skin and feathers that caused numbness and tingling sensations to the bird-touchers.
It creeps on trunks and branches in search of its insects diet. The toxins are acquired from part of its diet, the Choresine beetle.[1]
A common species in its large range, the Blue-capped Ifrita is evaluated as Least Concern on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species.
Inhabits and endemic to rainforests of New Guinea, it is placed in the family Cinclosomatidae.
The genus Ifrita is the second bird genus with poisonous member. The first being the genus Pitohui, also from New Guinea.
