Jeffery K. Chan documented a series of images showing a female Blue-winged Leafbird (Chloropsis cochinchinensis) eating an adult male Green Katydid (Orthoptera: Tettigoniidae) or long-horned grasshopper.
This leafbird regularly catches grasshoppers, including large ones. Here, the bird would have earlier subdued the grasshopper and in the process removed the limbs (above left). It then swallowed the insect head-first, wings and all (above right, below left). It apparently had one of the limbs with it, seen in the images (above right, below left) as the tinge of yellow to the right of the bird and on the branch, eating it last (below right).
/>
An earlier post showed a Brown Shrike (Lanius cristatus) dismembered a long-horned grasshopper before eating it, unlike this leafbird that swallowed it without dismembering it.
Images by Jeffery K. Chan, Dr Leong Tzi Ming identified the grasshopper.
This post is a cooperative effort between NaturePixels.org and BESG to bring the study of bird behaviour through photography to a wider audience.
