The Juan Fernández Firecrown is only found on one island, 700km off the coast of Chile.
The males of this species have a rich chestnut colour, with beautiful, flashing iridescent feathers on his crown and forehead. Females also model the iridescent head plumage, but with blue and green body, contrasting with a white breast. This crown is flashed at intruders during territorial disputes. Interestingly, unlike most other birds which have a 1:1 sex ratio, the sex ratio in this species is heavily skewed. There are three males to every female, and this could be as a result of intense intra and interspecies competition over access to flowers for food. This species is part of the Trochilidae hummingbird family, which diverged from all other species 26 million years ago. The major threats to this species are clearance and degradation of vegetation by humans and also the impact of herbivorous mammals, which limits the availability, quantity and quality of food sources. Predation from introduced animals has also been a problem for this species. There are conservation actions underway as the Juan Fernández islands were designated as a national park and became protected areas. They are now a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve and also nominated for World Heritage listing. There are also two island residents who act as project coordinators to control invasive plants and herbivores. The population of this species is now monitored.
Order: Caprimulgiformes
Family: Trochilidae
Population: 740
Trend:decreasing
Size: 13cm
EDGE Score
EDGE Score: 4.91 (?)
ED Score: 7.48 (?)
GE / IUCN Red List(?)
NENot EvaluatedDDData DeficientLCLeast ConcernNTNear ThreatenedVUVulnerableENEndangeredCRCritically EndangeredEWExtinct in the WildEXExtinct
Distribution
The species is found on the Juan Fernández islands, Chile.
Habitat and Ecology
This species lives in native forests, as its breeding is entirely dependent on native plant communities. However, it uses non-native plants for feeding during the non-breeding season. It is mainly nectarivorous (eats nectar) but small insects are taken from leaves or in flight.
For each key category of conservation action, we calculated a conservation attention score based on expert information. In this graph, a higher score means the action is being carried out more intensively over more of the species range. The colour shows how important each action is considered to be for the conservation of this species.
Engaging stakeholders
67
Addressing threats
67
Status of knowledge
78
Management plan
33
Capacity building
48
Behaviour change
7
Awareness raising
59
Funding
48
Legislation
74
0
20
40
60
80
100
Score: 100 means the activity occurs at high level across more than 75% of the species range
Priority:
High
Medium
Low
Very Low
Overall Conservation Attention
We combined all of the expert information on conservation actions to calculate an overall conservation attention score for this species. Please help us to reach our goal of establishing dedicated conservation attention at “High” levels for all EDGE species.
Very LowLowMediumHigh
46%
More information
Recent studies have grouped all possible conservation activities for any species into nine key categories (Washington et. al 2015). For each action, we asked experts for each species to assess the extent to which that action is being carried out and how much of the species’ range that action occurs in. For each action we used these two pieces of information to calculate the conservation attention score per action. A score of 100 means that the action is being carried out to a high level across at least 75% of the species range. We then combined the scores for all actions into an overall conservation attention score for the species. The experts also judged how important each category was to the conservation of that particular species.
This wordcloud illustrates the threats facing this species. The size of each word indicates the extent of a species range that is affected by that threat (larger size means a greater area is affected). The colour of the word indicates how much that threat impacts the species (darker shades of red mean the threat is more severe).
The EDGE score is used to prioritise EDGE species for conservation attention. Within a group of species, higher values mean that the species is a higher priority. The score is calculated by combining the ED and GE scores given below. The black line on the EDGE bar shows the mean EDGE score for all species in this taxonomic group, so you can see how high this species’ EDGE score is compared to the rest of the group.
ED is the Evolutionary Distinctiveness of this species, measured in millions of years. This number represents the unique evolutionary history surviving in this species. The black line on the ED bar shows the median ED score for all species in this taxonomic group, so you can see how high this species’ ED score is within compared to the rest of the group.
The Global Endangerment (GE) or IUCN Red List category, describes how close this species is to becoming extinct. Species that are Vulnerable, Endangered, or Critically Endangered are considered to be at significant risk of extinction.
