This video says about itself:
Two of Papua New Guinea‘s many birds of paradise – the Magificent and the King – put on an show of dancing and hanging upside down in spectacular courtship display.
The avian fossil record in Insular Southeast Asia and its implications for avian biogeography and palaeoecology
Abstract
Excavations and studies of existing collections during the last decades have significantly increased the abundance as well as the diversity of the avian fossil record for Insular Southeast Asia. The avian fossil record covers the Eocene through the Holocene, with the majority of bird fossils Pleistocene in age. Fossil bird skeletal remains represent at least 63 species in 54 genera and 27 families, and two ichnospecies are represented by fossil footprints. Birds of prey, owls and swiftlets are common elements.
Extinctions seem to have been few, suggesting continuity of avian lineages since at least the Late Pleistocene, although some shifts in species ranges have occurred in response to climatic change. Similarities between the Late Pleistocene avifaunas of Flores and Java suggest a dispersal route across southern Sundaland. Late Pleistocene assemblages of Niah Cave (Borneo) and Liang Bua (Flores) support the rainforest refugium hypothesis in Southeast Asia as they indicate the persistence of forest cover, at least locally, throughout the Late Pleistocene and Holocene.
Pingback: Birds, dinosaurs, eggs and evolution | Dear Kitty. Some blog
Pingback: Belgian insect fossil discovery | Dear Kitty. Some blog
Pingback: Apeman and ‘walking with beasts’ palaeontology | Dear Kitty. Some blog
Pingback: Dinosaur age diving bird discovery in Japan | Dear Kitty. Some blog
Pingback: Fossil horses show climate change 33 million years ago | Dear Kitty. Some blog
Pingback: Oldest seed-eating perching bird discovered | Dear Kitty. Some blog
Pingback: International cave bear symposium in the Netherlands, September 2015 | Dear Kitty. Some blog