Laughing kookaburra

Appearance

The laughing kookaburra is the largest species of kingfisher, outsizing even the giant kingfisher in body mass. It is a stout, stocky bird 41–47 cm in length, with a large head, prominent brown eyes, and a long and robust bill. The sexes are very similar, although the female is usually larger and has less blue to the rump than the male. The male weighs 196–450 g, mean 307 g and the female 190–465 g, mean 352 g. They have a white or cream-coloured body and head with a dark brown stripe across each eye and more faintly over the top of the head. The wings and back are brown with sky blue spots on the shoulders. The tail is rusty reddish-orange with dark brown bars and white tips on the feathers. The heavy bill is black on top and bone-coloured on the bottom. The subspecies "D. n. minor" has a similar plumage to the nominate but is smaller in size.

The laughing kookaburra can be distinguished from the similarly sized blue-winged kookaburra by its dark eye, dark eye-stripe, shorter bill and the smaller and duller blue areas on the wing and rump. Male blue-winged kookaburras also differ in having a barred blue and black tail.

Distribution

The laughing kookaburra is native to eastern Australia and has a range that extends from the Cape York Peninsula in the north to Cape Otway in the south. It is present on both the eastern and the western sides of the Great Dividing Range. In the south the range extends westwards from Victoria to the Yorke Peninsula and the Flinders Ranges in South Australia.

It has been introduced into many other areas probably because of its reputation for killing snakes. In December 1891, the Western Australian parliament included 'Laughing Jackass' in the schedule of strictly preserved Australian native birds in the Game Bill, moved by Horace Sholl, member for North District. He described it as native of the North West. His nomination is, therefore, certainly a reference to the blue-winged kookaburra, not the laughing kookaburra. "The Game Act, 1892", "An Act to provide for the preservation of imported birds and animals, and of native game," provided that proclaimed Australian native birds and animals listed in the First Schedule of the Act could be declared protected from taking. Laughing Jackass was one of 23 Australian native bird species named in the schedule.

Laughing kookaburras from Eastern States were released to the South West as early as 1883, with birds being noted between Perth and Fremantle, as well as up in Mullewa around 1896. The Acclimatization Society imported and released hundreds of birds between 1897 and 1912. Mainly via Ernest Le Souef who was Secretary of the Acclimatization Society and Director of Perth Zoological Gardens, an enthusiastic supporter of the Kookaburra who admitted to releasing hundreds from the Zoo, including 50 in 1900 at the Royal request of the visiting Duke of York.

By 1912 breeding populations had been established in a number of areas. The present range in Western Australia is southwest of a line joining Geraldton on the west coast and Hopetoun on the south coast. In Tasmania the laughing kookaburra was introduced at several locations beginning in 1906. It now mainly occurs northeast of a line joining Huonville, Lake Rowallan, Waratah and Marrawah. It was introduced on Flinders Island in around 1940, where it is now widespread, and on Kangaroo Island in 1926.

In the 1860s, during his second term as governor of New Zealand, George Grey arranged for the release of laughing kookaburras on Kawau Island. The island lies in the Hauraki Gulf, about 40 km north of Auckland on the North Island of New Zealand. It was thought that the introduction had been unsuccessful but in 1916 some birds were discovered on the adjacent mainland. It now breeds in a small region on the western side of the Hauraki Gulf between Leigh and Kumeu.

Status

The population density of the laughing kookaburra in Australia varies between 0.04 and 0.8 birds/ha depending on the habitat. Assuming an average of 0.3 birds/ha the total population may be as large as 65 million individuals. However, this may represent a severe over-estimate since the population of the laughing kookaburra seems to be undergoing a marked decline with Birdata showing a 50% drop in sightings from 2000 to 2019, and a drop in the reporting rate from 25% to 15% over the same period. The population in New Zealand is relatively small and is probably less than 500 individuals. Given the extended range and the large stable population, the species is evaluated as of "least concern" by the International Union for Conservation of Nature.

Behavior

Squawking is another common form of acoustic communication in "D. novaeguineae" that is used in a slew of different contexts. Laughing kookaburras have been noted to squawk when nesting, exhibiting submissive behavior, and when fledglings are waiting to be fed. Laughing kookaburras have a greater repertoire of calls than other kookaburra species like the Blue-winged kookaburra that produces two simple types of calls: “barks” and “hiccups”. This large range of calls is highlighted through cadencing, intonation, and frequency modulations that allow more detailed information to be conveyed.Kookaburras occupy woodland territories in loose family groups, and their laughter serves the same purpose as a great many other bird calls—to mark territorial borders. Most species of kookaburras tend to live in family units, with offspring helping the parents hunt and care for the next generation of offspring.

Habitat

The usual habitat is open sclerophyll forest and woodland. It is more common where the understory is open and sparse or where the ground is covered with grass. Tree-holes are needed for nesting. It also occurs near wetlands and in partly cleared areas or farmland with trees along roads and fences. In urban areas it is found in parks and gardens. The range of the laughing kookaburra overlaps with that of the blue-winged kookaburra in an area of eastern Queensland that extends from the Cape York Peninsula south to near Brisbane. Around Cooktown the laughing kookaburra tends to favour areas near water while the blue-winged kookaburra keeps to drier habitats.

A single individual Laughing Kookaburra, has been living wild, in Suffolk, in the UK, since at least 2015, being most recently sighted in 2024.

Reproduction

During mating season, the laughing kookaburra reputedly indulges in behaviour similar to that of a wattlebird. The female adopts a begging posture and vocalises like a young bird. The male then offers her his current catch accompanied with an "oo oo oo" sound. However, some observers maintain that the opposite happens – the female approaches the male with her current catch and offers it to him. Nest-building may start in August with a peak of egg-laying from September to November. If the first clutch fails, they will continue breeding into the summer months.

The female generally lays a clutch of three semi-glossy, white, rounded eggs, measuring 36 mm × 45 mm, at about two-day intervals. Both parents and auxiliaries incubate the eggs for 24–26 days. Hatchlings are altricial and nidicolous, fledging by day 32–40. If the food supply is not adequate, the third egg will be smaller and the third chick will also be smaller and at a disadvantage relative to its larger siblings. Chicks have a hook on the upper mandible, which disappears by the time of fledging. If the food supply to the chicks is not adequate, the chicks will quarrel, with the hook being used as a weapon. The smallest chick may even be killed by its larger siblings. If food is plentiful, the parent birds spend more time brooding the chicks, so the chicks are not able to fight.

Food

Kookaburras hunt much as other kingfishers do, by perching on a convenient branch or wire and waiting patiently for prey to pass by. Common prey include mice and similar-sized small mammals, a large variety of invertebrates, yabbies, small fish, lizards, frogs, small birds and nestlings, and most famously, snakes. Small prey are preferred, but kookaburras sometimes take large creatures, including venomous snakes, much longer than their bodies. When feeding their young, adult laughing kookaburras will make “Chuck calls”, which are deep, guttural calls that differ significantly from their daily chorus songs.