Blyth’s Hornbill is a common bird in New Guinea. It is the only species of hornbill that occurs there. Its distribution stretches from the islands of Halmahera and Bacan in the west, through the non-mountainous regions of New Guinea to the Solomon islands. This one is a male. In the late afternoon he sat in the top of a tree long enough to be photographed. We had just landed on the island of Waigeo off the north-western tip of New Guinea.
Sometimes known as Papuan Hornbill (which would incorrectly imply a distribution limited to New Giuinea and its immediate offshore islands), this species has the scientific name Rhyticeros plicatus. However, it was, for decades, Aceros plicatus.
Apparently, crinkles on the casque are added at the rate of one per year until there are about six. Then older wrinkles begin to break off. This male has five or six as far as I can see. The female has a black neck; she is walled into the nest by mud as in all hornbills.
The hornbill was named for Edward Blyth (1810 –1873), the impecunious and highly unfortunate curator from 1841 to 1863 of the museum of the Asiatic Society of Bengal in Calcutta.
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