Starnoenas cyanocephala
Silhouette: Sheatherius · PhyloPic
In 3 days <5% in a week ~10%
The blue-headed quail dove (Starnoenas cyanocephala), or blue-headed partridge-dove, is a species of bird in the pigeon and dove family Columbidae that is endemic to the island of Cuba. It is monotypic within the subfamily Starnoenadinae and genus Starnoenas.
In 1734 the English naturalist Eleazar Albin included a picture and a description of the blue-headed quail-dove in his A Natural History of Birds. His drawing was made from a live bird that had been brought to England from the East Indies. When in 1758 the Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus updated his Systema Naturae for the tenth edition, he placed the blue-headed quail-dove with all the other pigeons in the genus Columba. Linnaeus included a brief description, coined the binomial name Columba cyanocephala and cited Albin's work. The specific epithet combines the Ancient Greek kuanos meaning "dark blue" and -kephalos meaning "-headed". It is now the only species placed in the genus Starnoenas that was introduced by the French naturalist Charles Lucien Bonaparte in 1838. The species is monotypic; no subspecies are accepted.
A taxonomic review of the species' taxonomic history, morphology, anatomy, behavior, distribution... Wikipedia →
| # | Park | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Ciénaga de Zapata | 🇨🇺 Cuba |
More parks will be added in future updates.
| # | Zoo / Centre | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Zoo Pilsen | 🇨🇿 Czechia | |
| 2 | Zoo d'Upie | 🇫🇷 France |
Rare
Under 5% of wildlife watchers report a Blue-headed Quail-Dove sighting in Ciénaga de Zapata on a given day, based on 56 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data from 2019 to 2026. It is the 152nd most-seen of the 177 birds we can rate there. Over three days the chance rises to under 5%, and over a week to about 10%, if each day is a fresh chance.
June and October
In those months about 10% of wildlife watchers report a Blue-headed Quail-Dove in Ciénaga de Zapata on a given day, against under 5% in July–August and November–May, the lowest months. Those are among Ciénaga de Zapata's wettest months, with about 130 mm of rain a month against 15 mm in February. September has too few records to rate.
Between 7 and 10 am
Across all the parks we cover, that three-hour window holds the most Blue-headed Quail-Dove sightings with a recorded time, and about 8 in 10 of them come between 6 am and 6 pm: it is a daytime animal.
Only Ciénaga de Zapata, in our data
Ciénaga de Zapata is the only park on Wallace's Line with enough records to rate Blue-headed Quail-Dove sightings: under 5% of wildlife watchers there report one on a given day.
Same family: Columbidae
The closest relatives of the Blue-headed Quail-Dove that you can see in Ciénaga de Zapata (family Columbidae, Pigeons and Doves) are White-crowned Pigeon (about 30%), Common Ground-Dove (about 30%) and Mourning Dove (about 30%), with each one's daily chance of a sighting.
GBIF citizen-science records
It is estimated from how often the Blue-headed Quail-Dove is recorded against all the birds logged in Ciénaga de Zapata (56 verified sightings from 2019 to 2026), calibrated against known sighting rates. Figures are rounded to the nearest 10% because citizen-science data supports honest approximations, not decimals, and months with records from fewer than five people show "—". How it works.
