SAN DIEGO ZOO COMMITS KAGU FRAUD!

So I really wanted to see a kagu and made a real effort to find where their aviary was. I found the right enclosure and was thrilled to see a grey bird that didn't look exactly like picture, but it was the only grey bird in the enclosure. I got home and looked up kagu pictures on the internet and these are clearly not kagus. AUUUUUGGGGGGHHHHHH!

they appear to be some kind of pigeon

Chlidonias said:

they appear to be some kind of pigeon

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Speckled would you say?

I can't tell. They are very blurry.....somehow David managed to get every single part of the photo out of focus!!

Moebelle said:

Speckled would you say?

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I've no idea about what they actually are but we could rule out speckled pigeons. The birds in this photo look a lot darker and their faces and feet are much redder than any I've ever seen.

P.S. Below is a photo I took of speckled pigeons at Twycross Zoo. It doesn't really prove much but I quite like it

Was this the bus aviary or Polar Bear Plunge?

you know what you need to do David. If you come over to Australia and New Zealand, add in a week extra for New Caledonia. Return flights aren't very expensive between Auckland and Noumea (and possibly cheaper from Australia), the island isn't as expensive as people make it out to be so long as you're happy camping and eating supermarket food, and you can then see kagu at the Noumea Zoo and in the wild. If I have some spare time I might even join you and point out a kagu for you

Ituri said:

Was this the bus aviary or Polar Bear Plunge?

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The Polar Bear Plunge aviary.

Ah, then did you look in the top left corner in the back of the aviary? That's where they were hanging out when I was there.

Also, these are Papuan Mountain Pigeons (Gymnophaps albertisii) which aren't exactly Kagu, but are amazingly cool in their own right.

Perhaps the zoo should be accusing you of zoological ineptitude?
These are indeed Papuan Mountain Pigeons, quite distinct from Kagus!