| Storks (Latin: Ciconiidae) is a family of wading birds from the long-legged order, covering six genus and nineteen species.
The stork family is distributed not only in the tropics and subtropics but also in moderate zones. Only two species are found in Europe - the white stork (Ciconia ciconia) and black stork (Ciconia nigra). The other two species are considered to be extremely rare - the yellow- billed stork (Mycteria ibis) and the Marabou stork (Leptoptilos crumeniferus).
Basically, storks prefer to live in open areas and near reservoirs. Common features of the stork family are long feet, long flexible necks and also long, conic bills. Feathers, as a rule, are broad and severely distributed. All storks are good fliers, skillfully using energy economic thermals in flight. Many species accomplish long flights every year.
Storks collect food on the move from the ground. Small rodents, amphibians, fishes, some invertebrates and reptiles mainly form food for storks. Some kinds of storks, for example, the Marabou stork, also eat carrion.
The majority of storks don't have a voice, and make a unique sound by knocking with their bills. However, some kinds can sing and black storks are one example of this.
The Far East stork is a vanishing species. Rather recently, in the beginning of our century, it nested in Japan and Korea.
The Black stork (Ciconia nigra) is somewhat smaller than the white stork. The length of its feathers are 54 cm on average and it weights around 3kg. The feathering of this bird is predominantly black with a green and copper-red metallic shade and the ventral side of the body is white. The bill, legs, throat, featherless spot on bridle and its eyes are bright red. The black stork is widely spread. It inhabits the south of the Iberian Peninsula, from Germany and the Balkan Peninsula on east up to the shores of the Sea of Japan and Sakhalin. In the south, the black stork is found up to the shores of the Persian Gulf. Black Storks spend winters in Africa, in the south of the Sahara, as well as in the Ganges basin and south-east of China. The black stork is a forest bird. The prerequisites for its nesting is a combination of old forests or at least groups of old trees with hard to reach marshes of varied nature and open banks of rivers and lakes. In most of the areas, black storks nest in hard-to-access sparsely populated regions. Like all long-legged birds, black storks are monogamous and start reproduction at the age of three.
Shortly after arrival, which happens at the end of March of in the beginning of April, the couples start constructing their nests on high spreading trees but usually not at the tree top but on side branches around 1.5 - 2 m from trunk. The black stork does not form colonies. Nests of black storks are usually located somewhere around 6 km from each other but only in Eastern Transcaucasia, the nests are located at a distance of 1 km and sometimes two nests are found on a single tree.
Nests of black storks are also found in the recesses of rocks & high cliffs. For several years, black storks live in only one nest. Thus, a nest of black storks is famous in the Bialowieza Forest, in which one black stork raised its chicks for 14 years in a row. The nest is constructed with knots, sometimes with so much thickness, that the bird could hardly cope with them. With the help of grass, sand and clay, these knots are joined with each other. In comparison with the nest of white stork, nests of black storks are made more neatly and skillfully and the nest more or less has a regular hemispherical shape. Black storks lay 4 eggs and sometimes even more - up to 6 eggs sometimes. Only 2 or 3 eggs are laid by the white storks. Eggs are laid within an interval of two days and the birds start hatching about a day after laying the first egg. Hatching is done by both male and female black storks. The duration of hatching, in the majority of cases, is 35 - 46 days but sometimes the chicks start coming only after 30 days after being laid. Often, one or two sterile eggs (addle eggs) are found in the batch of laid eggs and hence, chicks are usually less in number than the number of eggs laid. Chicks emerge covered with a thick down of white or slightly grayish color. The bills of the chicks are brightly colored, orange at the base and greenish yellow at the tip. For a long period (around 10 days), chicks lie in a reclining position and then in a sitting position and only at the age of 35 - 40 days, do they start standing on their legs. At the age of 50 days, the chick is already fully-fledged but still may stay in the nest. During this period, they gain weight, superior to the weight of their parents and then lose some weight, because this time, parents give the chicks less intake. Young black storks start flying at the age of 64-65 days.
|
