Otis tarda

Adult Great Bustards have similar body shapes and plumage of both sexes, but females are smaller. The male bird in the breeding season has a blue-gray front neck and upper chest, with a dark brown vertical stripe in the center of the head from the base of the beak to the occipital area, and slender white fine feathers on the chin, throat and corners of the mouth, protruding outward from the throat like whiskers, up to 10-12 cm long. The chin and upper throat are grayish white with a light rust color. The base of the back neck is chestnut brown, and the upper body is chestnut brown with thick black horizontal spots and black insect-like fine horizontal spots. The primary and secondary flight feathers are dark brown with white feather bases; the great coverts and most of the tertiary flight feathers are white, and the middle coverts and minor coverts are gray with white end spots. There are broad chestnut brown horizontal bands on both sides of the prothorax, and the rest of the lower bo

The Great Bustard is found in southern Europe, northern Morocco, the Middle East, northern Afghanistan, Central Asia, southern Siberia, Mongolia, east to eastern Russia, and occasionally in India and Japan.
The countries of distribution are Afghanistan, Armenia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Bulgaria, China, Croatia, Czech Republic, Georgia, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iran, Iraq, Italy, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Macedonia, Moldova, Mongolia, Montenegro, Morocco, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Slovakia, Spain, Syria, Tajikistan, Turkey, Turkmenistan, Ukraine and Uzbekistan.
Extinct in: Belarus, Poland.
Reintroduced: France.
Migrant birds: Albania, Belgium, Cyprus, Denmark, Egypt, Finland, Gibraltar, Ireland, Israel, Japan, South Korea, Democratic People's Republic of Korea, Latvia, Lebanon, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Tunisia. The Great Bustard is a typical grassland bird. It mainly inhabits open plains, arid grasslands, savannas and semi-desert a

The Great Bustard has two subspecies, both of which are distributed in China. The common subspecies breeds in Qiqihar, Heilongjiang, Tongyu and Zhenlai, Jilin, northwest Liaoning, and Inner Mongolia. It hibernates in Liaoning, Hebei, Shanxi, Henan, Shandong, Shaanxi, Jiangxi, Hubei and other provinces, and is occasionally seen in Fujian. In addition, a small number of populations stay in the breeding grounds all year round. The nominate subspecies breeds in western and eastern Xinjiang.

The name of the bustard comes from such a legend: In ancient times, there was a kind of bird that lived together in groups, and the number of each group was always seventy, forming a small family. So people linked the number of its groups together, and added a "seventy" to the left of the word "bird", forming "bustard".

Great Bustards are cold-resistant and alert, and are difficult to approach. They are good at running and do not sing. When not migrating, their flying height does not exceed 200 meters. They gather together for most of the year, forming groups composed of individuals of the same sex and age; in the same community, female and male groups are separated by a certain distance. When frightened, they lower their heads, arch their backs, spread their tail feathers upward in a fan-like shape, half-open their wings, and lower their wrists. They make a "haha" panting sound from their mouths, in order to scare off the intruders and prevent them from approaching. If the enemy is very strong, they will take off immediately, making it difficult to approach. Due to their heavy weight, they usually need to trot a few steps on the ground when taking off. When running up, they raise their heads, stretch their beaks forward and horizontally, slightly arch their necks and tilt them forward and upward, spread their wings, lean their center of gravity forward, and take big steps forward rhythmically. As the running-up speed increases, the frequency of flapping their wings also increases until their feet leave the ground and fly. But it can fly directly in an emergency. When flying, the neck and legs are straight, the wings are flat, the legs are stretched back under the tail feathers, and the wings are flapped slowly and powerfully. The flying height is not too high, but the flying ability is very strong. It often soars during migration, so it is also one of the largest flying birds in the world today. If other birds of the same kind enter the territory or compete for a mate, the two sides will fight. First, they slowly approach each other, hold each other's necks, and push each other with their chests. If one side retreats, the other side will follow closely and continue to drive it out of the territory. If the two sides are evenly matched, they will both lower their heads, close to the ground, half-spread their wings, lower their shoulders, stand up their shoulder feathers and coverts, and raise their tail feathers. They stand forward in a fan shape, revealing white feathers. After approaching each other, they will peck each other's mouths.

When foraging, the Great Bustard lifts the back of its head upward, the tip of its beak points downward, and its eyes stare at the ground. It turns its head from time to time to observe insects, other small animals, and plant seeds on the ground. When eating grass, it often bites the grass with its mouth first, retracts its neck, then raises its head with force, pulls the grass apart, and then swallows it. Sometimes it pushes the ground with its feet forward, the body moves backward, and the wings are slightly or half-spread. When drinking water, it squats slightly or kneels on the ground with its tarsus, lowers its head, puts its mouth into the water, opens it slightly, then lifts its head, with the tip of its mouth diagonally upward at an angle of about 45 degrees, and at the same time, the pharynx moves quickly to swallow the water. The whole process is like taking water from the water with a spoon.

The Great Bustard has a diverse diet, mainly eating young leaves, buds, grass, seeds, insects, grasshoppers, frogs and other animal foods, especially weevils, rapeseed beetles, locusts and other farm pests. Sometimes they also eat grains scattered on the ground in the farmland. Young birds mainly eat insects, and their plant food gradually increases with age and seasons. From March to April, they mainly move around farmland, feeding on seeds scattered on the ground, such as soybeans, corn, sorghum, etc., and also on seeds of some wild plants, such as cassia bark; from May to June, they mainly feed on the inflorescences and growth points of some leguminous and Asteraceae plants, and also on some tender grass sprouts, wheat seedlings and insects; from July to September, the proportion of insects in their food increases, mainly some Orthoptera, Coleoptera and Lepidoptera insects such as locusts, beetles, dragonflies and some moth larvae, as well as some small frogs, shrimps, small fish, etc., and some tender sprouts; in October, the Great Bustards begin to gather in groups and return to farmland to feed on some grains and plant seeds.

Great Bustards begin breeding in mid-April every year. When male birds are courting and showing off, they first bend their legs slightly, straighten their necks, point their beaks horizontally forward, keep their bodies parallel to the ground, lift their tail feathers upward, and tend to fold toward their backs, thus revealing the white undertail coverts, indicating estrus. Generally, the more white feathers a male bird reveals, the more favored it is by female birds, and the more advantageous it is in the competition for mates. In the male bird's courtship dance, the throat expands into a hanging air sac due to rapid and continuous swallowing and exhalation, the exposed skin under the neck turns blue-gray, and the erected undernecked whiskers are divided into two left and right feathers. Then the head is tilted back and retracted toward the back, the undernecked whiskers are erected until they are under the eyes, the tail feathers are flattened on the back in a fan-like shape, almost touching the head, the wings are extended to the lower back of the body, the wrist joints are almost dragged to the ground, and the large and white coverts rotate upward in a fan-like shape. At the same time, the male bird moves vigorously with both legs and starts to circle around the female bird, which lasts for more than ten seconds to several minutes. At this time, the female bird attracted by the male bird will actively peck at the white feathers on the male bird's body, especially the white feathers at the anus, and the male bird will turn its body to the maximum extent and dance to its heart's content. The female bird also squats and stands up excitedly, and her head and neck quickly stretch up and down, showing her desire to dance with the male bird, or turn around and run away to lure the male bird to chase her. When the male bird catches up with the female bird, it will invert its wrist joint on the female bird's back and guide her to squat, so that the female bird lies on the ground. Then the male bird straddles the female bird's back from the side, fully spreads its wings to maintain its body balance, and repeatedly pecks at the feathers on the female bird's head with its beak, so that the female bird stands up under it and raises its tail to accept mating. When the male bird's body is close to the female bird and its tail presses against the female bird's tail, the mating action is completed. The male and female birds immediately jump apart, flap their wings, shake their bodies, and comb their feathers. After mating, the female leaves and looks for a ground nest with low grass and crops.

The Great Bustard's nest is just a shallow pit dug on the ground, with no nesting materials or the grass at the original place is trampled down for bedding. The diameter of the nest is 304 mm × 310 mm, and the depth is 41.5 mm. The female is responsible for the selection of nest sites and nesting. One nest of eggs is laid every year, usually from early May to June. If the eggs are lost, they can be replaced. Each nest contains 2 eggs, rarely 3 or 4 eggs, and the interval between laying eggs is 1-2 days. The eggs are smooth and shiny, dark green or olive, with light brown or dark brown spots. The size of the eggs is 77.4 mm × 55.5 mm, and the egg weight is 103.5 grams. After the first, second or last egg is laid, the female begins to incubate it. The incubation period is 31-32 days, and the eggs hatch asynchronously. The chicks are precocial and can leave the nest soon after hatching. They are cared for and fed by the female. They grow flight feathers at 30-35 days old and live independently in the first winter.

The sex ratio of the Great Bustard is unbalanced, with a male-female ratio of about 2.5:1. Females reach sexual maturity at 4 years old, and males reach sexual maturity at 5 years old. The mating system is polygamous and mixed. The polygamous system is one male and multiple females, with 5-7 females in total, and the females have social hierarchy. The mixed system is that each female mates with more than one male, and the mixed system is more common.

The various behaviors of the Great Bustard during the breeding season have a certain time allocation. There are differences in their time budget between sexes, and they vary with the size of the activity space, food conditions and the breeding stage. In the early breeding period, the Great Bustard's time budget is mainly based on feeding, resting, walking and observing. These four behaviors account for 87% and 93% of all behaviors of male and female bustards respectively; in the late breeding period, the time and intensity of various behaviors of female bustards change greatly. Great Bustards have different degrees of daily rhythms in feeding, resting and showing off. There are two peaks in feeding and showing off. Great Bustards are in a state of resting for most of the noon.

Although the Great Bustard is widely distributed, its population is generally on a downward trend worldwide, with an estimated total of about 29,700 individuals. It has disappeared in Europe and northern Africa, including Switzerland, Scotland, Sweden, Denmark, the Netherlands, France, Greece, Tunisia and Algeria, and is almost extinct in Eastern European countries.

The Great Bustard population in China was once quite abundant, with dozens of individuals often seen, but has become quite rare, with an estimated total of only 300-400 individuals. Habitat destruction, over-cultivation of grasslands and overgrazing have caused the Great Bustard to lose its suitable habitat. The extensive use of agricultural machinery and pesticides directly threatens the Great Bustard, its eggs and young bustards during the breeding period. Interference from various human production activities indirectly affects the reproduction of the bustard. The installation of power lines near grasslands and farmlands often causes great bustards to collide with the lines and die. Excessive hunting, hunting as a medicinal ingredient. Traditional Chinese medicine theory believes that the great bustard removes hair and internal organs, refines oil, nourishes the kidneys and strengthens yang, detoxifies and replenishes qi, and moisturizes the skin. Therefore, it is used, and the problem of poaching great bustards cannot be fundamentally eliminated. Intraspecific biological characteristics: Because great bustards nest on the ground, eggs are extremely vulnerable to damage by humans and other animals, which increases the loss of eggs in the nest and causes a decrease in numbers.

Listed in the "Red List of Endangered Species of the World Conservation Union" (IUCN) 2017 ver3.1-Vulnerable (VU).

Listed in Appendix I, Appendix II and Appendix III of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) 2019 Edition Appendix II.

Listed in China's "National Key Protected Wildlife List" (February 5, 2021) Level 1.

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