Oxpeckers

Originally published January 13, 2009 (The Manitoban, Vol. 97, No. 18)

That’s right I said oxpecker and no, I am not just gearing you up for Valentine’s Day folks, I am talking about birds. Vampiristic birds! What a way to get back into the swing of things, waking up and going home in the dark while the sun rises and sets with you stuck behind four walls that are most probably very insufficiently punctured by windows. 

Speaking of puncture, the oxpeckers belong to the family Buphagidae and are considered distant evolutionary relatives of the mockingbirds, thrashers, and starlings. There are two species, Red-billed and Yellow-billed oxpeckers. Native to Africa, they make their living primarily by hitching rides and feeding on large hoofed mammals such as wildebeest, impala, giraffe, rhinoceros, water buffalo and others. 

Oxpeckers feed heavily on parasites living off mammalian blood and tissues. They especially enjoy ticks but will also eat lice, mites, fleas, small insects and other organisms attempting to lodge within open wounds. They will also consume dead skin cells. Once thought to be a symbiotic relationship, with mammals benefiting by removal of the external parasites and birds benefiting by a nutritious (albeit disgusting) meal, that viewpoint no longer so certain. 

Instead, it may be that the oxpeckers are themselves a type of parasite. There are many observations of these birds actively feeding on the blood of their host mammals. Observations have been made of oxpeckers actively keeping wounds open, of using their bill to exert pressure around wounds to increase blood flow, and of drinking blood from wounds made by ticks without consuming the ticks themselves. Observations of the birds inflicting wounds themselves are apparently some combination of absent, rare, and/or unreliable. 

While some evidence exists to show that oxpeckers can actually weaken and stress their mammalian hosts by keeping wounds open, they also keep wounds free of bacteria and other infectious agents; so, while they may be riddled with open sores, they are at least clean sores. Most animals tolerate the oxpeckers, and many have learned to respond to oxpecker alarm calls and thus gain protection in the form of an early-warning system for predators. Not all of our hoofed friends appreciate these offers however; elephants and some species of antelope actively and effectively avoid, resist, and remove the oxpeckers from their body.

What is certain is that oxpeckers rely heavily on large African mammals. They feed, sleep, court, and even mate on their backs, and use their hair and dung to build nests. They also eat ear wax!

Red-billed Oxpecker

Yellow-billed Oxpecker