Phasianid

The chukar, a bird of the phasianid family, is distributed in Israel across a sharp climatic cline from Mediterranean regions in the north to extremely arid areas only ~200 km away in the Negev Desert.

The megapode is viewed as a ‘specialised’ galliform, having extended the phasianid incubation period and producing superprecocial hatchlings that have developed in the egg for a further four weeks.

It is a medium-sized phasianid: males can weight even 600 grams and are bigger than the females. Moreover, unlike the females, they have ergots on the claws.

Typical of many phasianid birds, guinea fowl are capable runners that have strong burst-flight capacities but little endurance in flight.