Explore: Oxpeckers

example of mutualism, but recent evidence suggests that oxpeckers may be parasites instead. Oxpeckers do eat ticks, but often the ticks have already fed on

flows. Whatever the net result, mammals generally tolerate oxpeckers. The yellow-billed oxpecker is 20 cm (7.9 in) long and has plain brown upperparts and

2022. "Buphagus erythrorhynchus (Red-billed oxpecker)". www.biodiversityexplorer.org. "Red-billed Oxpeckers – Beauty of Birds". www.beautyofbirds.com.

sites include large herbivores on the African savanna that are used by oxpeckers. Many sleeping birds bend their heads over their backs and tuck their

impala is the smallest ungulate with which oxpeckers are associated. In a study it was observed that oxpeckers selectively attended to impala despite the

birds, including the vampire finch, Hood mockingbird, Tristan thrush, and oxpeckers, also practice hematophagy. Hematophagous animals have mouth parts and

pests. Red-billed oxpeckers and black rhinos have a symbiotic relationship. The oxpeckers feed on the bugs found on rhinos and the oxpeckers warn the rhinos

2021). "Nuthatches, Wallcreeper, treecreepers, mockingbirds, starlings, oxpeckers". IOC World Bird List Version 11.1. International Ornithologists' Union

living fossils. See for example the uniquely and highly autapomorphic oxpeckers, which appear to be the only survivors of an ancient lineage related to

represent an extinct starling (see Rodrigues starling for details). The oxpeckers are sometimes placed here as a subfamily, but the weight of evidence has