Talk:Oilbird

This level-5 vital article is rated C-class on Wikipedia's content assessment scale.
It is of interest to the following WikiProjects:

Birds High‑importance

Oilbird is part of WikiProject Birds, an attempt at creating a standardized, informative and easy-to-use ornithological resource. If you would like to participate, visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks. Please do not substitute this template.BirdsWikipedia:WikiProject BirdsTemplate:WikiProject Birdsbird articles

High

This article has been rated as High-importance on the project's importance scale.

WikiProject Birds To-do:

Here are some tasks awaiting attention:

Article requests : Endemic birds of Papua New Guinea (more)
Cleanup : Bullfinch • Vesper sparrow • Bird flight • Bird bath (more)
Copyedit : Plushcap • Magpie duck • Saker falcon (more)
Expand : Phalarope • Nidicolous • Gouldian finch • Cathartes • Cnemophilidae • Avian malaria (more)
NPOV : Debeaking • Driven grouse shooting • Abu Dhabi Falcon Hospital (more)
Stubs : Cathartiformes • Semiplumbeous hawk • Rainbow-bearded Thornbill • Sunda scops owl (more)
Update : Coal tit • Scottish crossbill • New Caledonian lorikeet • Operation Migration (more)
Verify : Argus (bird) • Blyth's frogmouth • Nik Borrow • Pytilia • Fregata • Chestnut-headed tesia • Darter • Pallid scops owl • Starling (more)
Wikify : Ninox boobook ocellata • The Institute for Bird Populations (more)
Other : Add photos to bird articles needing photos (search Flickr for free images). Add taxonomic authorities to genus articles.

More outstanding tasks at the project's cleanup listing, Category:Birds articles needing attention, and Wikipedia:WikiProject Birds/Todo.

Venezuela Start‑class

	Venezuela portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject Venezuela, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Venezuela on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.VenezuelaWikipedia:WikiProject VenezuelaTemplate:WikiProject VenezuelaVenezuela articles
Start	This article has been given a rating which conflicts with the project-independent quality rating in the banner shell. Please resolve this conflict if possible.
???	This article has not yet received a rating on the project's importance scale.
	This article has been automatically rated by a bot or other tool because one or more other projects use this class. Please ensure the assessment is correct before removing the `\|auto=` parameter.

Untitled[edit]

It would be great to have a good picture of one of these birds, or one of the mass of them flying out of a cave at dusk.

I agree. Unfortunately, the Trinidad site no longer allows flash photography, and the pics I took by torchlight were too poor to use. jimfbleak 08:11, 19 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

managed to find one on Flickr! Sabine's Sunbird talk 03:06, 18 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Changed "the most accessible" to the less absolute claim "one of the most accessible", and changed "up to 2500" to "2500 or more", since several sites claim 15,000 to 20,000 birds for the Cueva del Guácharo (and I have seen them take well over an hour to come out of the cave as a constant stream.)--Lavintzin 03:07, 20 September 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Asa Wright center[edit]

138.238.41.70 had added some wording extolling the Asa Wright center as a world-renowned birdwatcher's haven. It seemed more like free advertising than relevant information to me, especially given that the center has its own page, so I reverted to something more like the original. (I left the change from "on" the center to "at" the center.)

--Lavintzin 22:20, 9 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Hooks on wings of squabs?[edit]

I seem to remember (from when I assisted Dr. Snow while he was studying these fascinating birds in the 1950s) that the squabs had little hooks on the elbow joints of their wings by which they could cling to the rock walls of the caves. Can anyone confirm this, please, or, even better, provide some reference for it? Many thanks, John Hill 23:10, 30 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Mould[edit]

I have read somewhere (HBW possibly) that there are some species of mould that like to grow on the rich oilbird guano, spreading spores all over the caves in the process, and that people with respiratory problems are therefore advised against visiting them unprotected. Might be worth adding. Dysmorodrepanis 03:40, 2 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

NOW you tell me!!! Mouldy Jim

It is possible that mould could affect some sensitive people - but I have never heard of it. Certainly, in the caves in which oilbirds live in Trinidad, WI, there are huge piles of dung from the oilbirds mixed with that of various species of bats which also inhabit the caves - and the piles are kept damp due to the water in the caves and would make an excellent medium for moulds to grow on. There is certainly a very musty smell.

Also, due to the prevalence of rabies in bats in Trinidad there is perhaps some slight danger to humans as studies have shown that the rabies virus can be present in the air of caves inhabited by bats and rabies can be transferred to caged animals in bat caves - presumably from infected bat urine in the air. However, I hasten to reassure people that this is all very unlikely. I worked in these caves for many weeks in the 1950s along with ornithologists and others connected with the New York Zoological Society's Tropical Research Station and the Trinidad Regional Virus Laboratory and I don't remember anyone coming down with odd respiratory complaints - let alone rabies!!! Nowadays, groups of tourists are taken regularly to visit the caves from the Asa Wright Nature Centre in Trinidad who could be contacted to see if they have had any problems. However, I think it is most unlikely anyone would develop any problems from a short visit to the caves - though perhaps those with pre-existing pulmonary problems would be best to avoid them. John Hill 07:18, 21 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

External links modified[edit]

Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified one external link on Oilbird. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:

Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20070716090718/http://database.biomimicry.org/item.php?table=organism&id=1120 to http://database.biomimicry.org/item.php?table=organism&id=1120

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

This message was posted before February 2018. After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than regular verification using the archive tool instructions below. Editors have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the RfC before doing mass systematic removals. This message is updated dynamically through the template {{source check}} (last update: 18 January 2022).

If you have discovered URLs which were erroneously considered dead by the bot, you can report them with this tool.
If you found an error with any archives or the URLs themselves, you can fix them with this tool.

Cheers.—InternetArchiveBot (Report bug) 17:07, 12 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Rictal bristles needs a link[edit]

Rictal bristles should link to the paragraph about them in the Beak article. Only the word Rictal was linked, and it was to the dictionary definitions/disambiguation page of Rictal which had nothing to do with the Rictal bristles bird whiskers. 207.112.55.242 (talk) 13:58, 20 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]