African Sacred Ibis
Leisure Isle, South Africa
The African sacred ibis is a wader native to Africa and the Middle East. It breeds in sub-Saharan Africa and southeastern Iraq. A number of populations are migrant.
Habit
The African sacred ibis inhabits marshy wetlands and mud flats, both inland and on the coast. It prefers to nests on trees in or near water.
Feeding
The African sacred ibis eats mainly insects, worms, crustaceans, molluscs and other invertebrates, as well as various fish, frogs, reptiles, small mammals and carrion. It feeds while wading in shallow wetlands or in wet pastures with soft soil probing for invertebrates such as worms with its long, curved bill. It will sometimes feed on seeds.
Breeding
The African sacred ibis constructs a nest of sticks often in a baobab tree. It often joins colonies of other large wading birds including herons, storks and spoonbills. It also form single-species colonies of up to a thousand birds, for instance, in abandoned buildings or on offshore islands. Both parents incubate 1 to 5 eggs. One parent guards the nest for the first 7 days before joining its partner in feeding the chicks.
Wildfile Specials
- The sacred ibis was considered the living incarnation of the Egyptian god, Thoth. Pilgrims from all over Egypt brought thousands of ibis offerings to four or more main temples, which at their peak mummified and buried thousands of birds a year in gigantic and ancient catacombs (one complex was in operation for 700 years). Eventually, an estimated eight million birds were mummified and entombed by the Ancient Egyptians.
- When Moses led the Hebrews in a war against the Ethiopians, he brought a great number of sacred ibis in cages. They were used to counter their enemy's flying serpents.
- A number of mosaics and frescoes in Pompeii and Herculaneum depict sacred Ibises. This was because the sacred ibis was a symbol of the god Isis which was worshipped by Romans around the time of the eruption on Vesuvius.
- According to Pliny and Galen sacred ibises invented the clyster or enema which it applied to hippopotami using its beak and saltwater.
- According to some Roman authorities, the sacred ibis procreated with its bill.