Balearica
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| Balearica | ||||||||||||
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Basityto |
The bird genus Balearica consists of two species in the crane family Gruidae: the Black-crowned Crane (B. pavonina) and the Grey-crowned Crane (B. regulorum).
The species today occur only in Africa, south of the Sahara Desert, and are the only cranes that can nest in trees. This habitat is one reason why the relatively small Balearica cranes are believed to closely resemble the ancestral members of the Gruidae.
Like all cranes, they eat insects, reptiles, and small mammals.
[edit] Fossil record
Crowned cranes seem to have been more widespread prehistorically. As opposed to the true cranes, genus Grus, which were always common in the Holarctic and adjacent regions, the present genus appears to have had a more Atlantic distribution, ranging into Europe and North America; it is not known from the fossil record of cranes from Asia.
- Balearica rummeli (Early Miocene of Germany) - formerly Basityto
- Balearica excelsa (Early - Middle Miocene of France) - formerly Grus and Ornithocnemus
- Balearica exigua (Miocene of Nebraska)
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