Hoopoe
monotypic family of birds
Hoopoes () are colourful birds found across Africa, Asia, and Europe, notable for their distinctive "crown" of feathers which can be raised or lowered at will. Two living and one extinct species are recognized, though for many years both extant species were lumped as a single species—Upupa epops. In fact, some taxonomists still consider the species to be conspecific. On the other hand, some authorities recognize three living species, with the African hoopoe (U. africana) treated as separate from the Eurasian hoopoe (U. epops). The Eurasian hoopoe is common in its range and has a large population, so it is evaluated as Least Concern on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. However, their numbers are declining in Western Europe. Conversely, the hoopoe has been increasing in numbers at the tip of the South Sinai, Sharm el-Sheikh. There are dozens of nesting pairs that remain resident all year round.
Taxonomy
The genus Upupa was introduced in 1758 by the Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus in the tenth edition of his Systema Naturae. The type species is the Eurasian hoopoe (Upupa epops).
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Hoopoe” as monotypic family of birds. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
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The subject matters to the general reference register because the source frames it as monotypic family of birds. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 18, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q20977. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1758.
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This entry incorporates text from “Hoopoe” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.