KINGFISHER. The common king fisher, Alcedo ispida, is a beautiful Euro pean bird, extending also to Northern Africa and South-west Asia to Sindh.
Nowhere very abundant, the brilliant blue-green back and chestnut breast render it conspicuous. The sexes are alike. Its food, which it obtains by plung ing into the water, consists of small fish, Crustacea and aquatic insects. The legend of the kingfishers, the transformed Ceyx and Alcyone, nesting on the waves during the seven "Halcyon days" (Ovid, Metam. bk. xi.) is but a legend. In actual fact, the birds nest, early in the year, in a tunnel which they excavate in a bank. The nest consists of the fish-bones which the parents throw up, and in it six to eight white, translucent eggs are laid. When the young hatch, the mixture of these bones with the faeces (which the parents, unlike most birds, do not remove) and decaying fish forms a dripping, fetid mass. The flesh of the kingfisher is said to be distasteful to birds of prey. The American belted kingfisher (Megaceryle alcyon) is larger and less brilliantly coloured.
The family Alcedinidae to which the kingfisher belongs is re lated to the hornbills (Bucero tidae) and consists of two sub families, Alcedininae and Dacel oninae. Very uniform in struc ture, the kingfishers are charac terized by the feebleness of the feet, in which the third and fourth digits are united (syndac tylism) ; in two genera, Alcyone, and Ceyx, the second digit is aborted. Tanysiptera is remark able for the elongation of the middle pair of tail feathers, which are spatulate. The family is cosmopolitan, though only one genus, Megaceryle, is found in America. The Australian region is the headquarters of the group, and here are found the "laugh ing jackass," Dacelo gigas, and its relatives. Many kingfishers live on insects.
The only fossil kingfisher known is Halcyornis toliapicus, from the Eocene of Sheppey.