Germain's Peacock-Pheasant

Germain's peacock-pheasant is a medium-sized, dark brown forest pheasant about 56–60 cm long. Both sexes are finely mottled, but the male has a longer tail and rows of violet-blue to green eye-spots across the wings and tail that flash during display; the female is smaller and duller. Neither sex has the long head crest of the Vietnamese crested argus. The quiet plumage blends closely with leaf litter (Threatened Birds of Asia 2001; Wikipedia, general species account).

The species is centred on seasonal tropical forest in southern and south-central Vietnam, extending into far eastern Cambodia. It walks beneath evergreen and semi-evergreen canopy, taking seeds, fallen fruit and small invertebrates from leaf litter, and is most often detected by its calls. Cat Tien National Park is a well-known Vietnamese locality, while available distribution evidence extends north through south-central Annam. Forest conversion, degradation and ground-level snaring affect the same lowland habitat on which it depends (Threatened Birds of Asia 2001; Nguyen et al. 2024).