Bird of the Week – Trumpeter hornbill

THE Trumpeter hornbill is distributed from Port Elizabeth northwards along the Eastern coastal belt of KZN, into the low lying areas of the Limpopo and Zambezi river valleys and the whole of Mozambique through to Kenya.

These hornbills like forests and dense woodland with tall trees and riverine bushveld, where they forage by bouncing and hopping in the high branches.

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Food preference is fruit, especially figs and insects. Usually gregarious in flocks of up to 50 birds, they roost in groups of three to 12 birds. The flight is heavy and they can take off almost vertically in the forests.

The calls are very loud, either braying, laughing, trumpeting, squealing and wailing and they are mostly vocal in the mornings.

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The Trumpeter hornbill’s breeding season is October to December. Their nest is a natural hole in a tree where they seal the entrance to form a narrow slit. It can be located up to 12 metres above ground.

Two to four white eggs are laid, while incubation and nestling times are unrecorded.

The Zulu name is ikhunatha and in Afrikaans, die gewone boskraai.

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