Cabot's Tragopan

Cabot's tragopan is a plump, ground-dwelling pheasant from the mountains of south-east China, found in forests of evergreen and mixed deciduous and conifer trees between 600 and 1,800 metres. Males are about 60 cm long, with a black head, reddish-brown upperparts, straw-coloured underparts, blue horns over the eyes and an inflatable blue and orange wattle below the bill. Females are duller and spotted. The birds forage on the ground for roots, shoots, buds, fruits and seeds, and roost in trees. Chicks can fly soon after hatching.

About the Cabot's tragopan

Cabot's tragopan is a plump, forest-dwelling bird in the pheasant family, Phasianidae, found only in the mountains of southeastern China. It is one of five tragopans, the so-called horned pheasants, whose males inflate fleshy blue horns and a colorful throat bib during courtship. It nests in trees, which is unusual for its family.

The bird's common and scientific names both honor the American ornithologist Samuel Cabot III. Tragopan caboti is also called the Chinese tragopan or the yellow-bellied tragopan. Two subspecies are recognized: the main one across Fujian, Jiangxi, Zhejiang and Guangdong, and a second form, guangxiensis, limited to northeastern Guangxi and southern Hunan. Not every authority accepts that second subspecies.

The genus name has an old story behind it. "Tragopan" was a mythical horned, purple-headed bird mentioned by the Roman writers Pliny and Pomponius Mela. Despite the nickname "horned pheasants," tragopans are not true pheasants and are not closely related to them, even though they belong to the same broad family.

Cabot's tragopan is a stocky ground bird with fairly short legs and a short tail. Males grow to about 60 cm (24 in) and weigh around 1.4 kg (3 lb). Females are about 10 cm (4 in) shorter and weigh about 0.9 kg (2 lb). Males reach full adult plumage in their second year.

The adult male is dramatic. His head is black, with reddish-orange streaks along the sides and neck and matching bare orange skin on the cheeks and around the eyes. Above the eyes sit a pair of fleshy blue "horns," and below the bill hangs an inflatable wattle, or bib, in blue and orange. The upperparts are reddish-brown to chestnut with large buff spots, and the underparts are straw to cream colored.

The female is built for camouflage rather than display. Her head and back are reddish-brown with black spots and triangular white marks, and her underparts are grayish-brown with white markings.

Behavior and diet

Cabot's tragopan does most of its feeding on the ground. It forages for roots, shoots, buds, flowers, fruit and seeds, and occasionally eats small invertebrates. Diet shifts with the seasons. In winter and early spring it prefers the leaves of Daphniphyllum macropodum, a small evergreen tree, and in autumn it eats more fruit. Radio-tracking studies in China found that in winter the birds visit areas rich in acorns from Lithocarpus and Cyclobalanopsis oaks and the seeds of the Schima tree.

Daphniphyllum is more than food. The tragopans also use this tree as a night roost, and the species seems closely tied to its presence in the forest.

Breeding begins in spring, around March, and the male performs an elaborate courtship display. He starts in a sideways pose, standing very upright with his orange ear feathers puffed and his thigh feathers fluffed out so they look like a pair of short trousers. The edge of the bib already shows a band of bright turquoise.

Then the display builds. The male shakes his head rapidly until the blue horns stand up, about 8 cm (3 in) tall, and the bib unfolds. Fully spread, the bib is a long, roughly rectangular panel edged in pale yellow, with a turquoise border, step-like crimson patterns and an orange center dotted with blue. He calls with a series of sharp, insistent "tchi-tchi-tchi" notes. At the climax, lasting only a few seconds, he rises to full height, stretches his neck and legs, tucks his head, and gives a long, powerful "tchiiii."

The mating system is not fully settled. Males stay with a female early in the breeding season, but once she is incubating, they may wander off to feed alone or with other males, or mate with other females that enter their territory.

Unlike most members of its family, Cabot's tragopan nests in trees. The nest is usually built in a fork of a tree, often 4 to 7 m (13–23 ft) off the ground in pines or Japanese cedars near the forest edge. It is made of grass, moss, feathers and leaves, and the bird sometimes takes over an empty nest built by another species.

The female lays a clutch of roughly two to six eggs and incubates them alone for about 28 days. After hatching, she broods the chicks for two or three days, then the family leaves the nest together. The chicks can fly soon after hatching. Mother and young stay together through the winter, sometimes joining another family in a small group.

Range and habitat

Cabot's tragopan is endemic to the mountains of southeastern China. It lives in the provinces of Fujian, Guangdong, Guangxi, Hunan, Jiangxi and Zhejiang. It lives east of its closest relatives, Temminck's tragopan and the western tragopan.

Its habitat is subtropical evergreen broadleaf forest and mixed forest with deciduous and coniferous trees. It is usually found from about 600 to 1,800 m (2,000–5,900 ft) above sea level and has been recorded above the treeline. Seasonal ranges differ: in winter it tends to stay at about 800 to 1,000 m (2,600–3,300 ft), and in summer at about 800 to 1,400 m (2,600–4,600 ft).

The population is broken into isolated patches. The species does not disperse well and seems unwilling to cross gaps in forest cover wider than about 500 m (1,600 ft). As a result, it survives mainly in isolated, largely intact forests.

Cabot's tragopan vs other pheasants

Cabot's tragopan shares the family Phasianidae with birds such as the golden pheasant and the Palawan peacock-pheasant, but the tragopans stand apart in a few ways.

Conservation status

Cabot's tragopan is listed as Vulnerable on the IUCN Red List, in a 2020 assessment by BirdLife International. Fewer than 10,000 birds are thought to remain, and the population is decreasing.

Habitat loss is the main threat. Natural forest is being converted to farmland and to conifer and bamboo plantations, which removes the forked trees the bird needs for nesting. Illegal hunting still occurs in some areas.

The species occurs in some protected areas, but most of them are small. Conservation ideas include restoring degraded forest and replanting Daphniphyllum macropodum, and providing artificial nesting platforms to make up for lost nest trees.