The Common Kingfisher (Alcedo atthis) is Europe's most vividly coloured bird — an electric blue upperside shifting from cobalt to emerald depending on the light, a chestnut-orange underside, and a bill nearly half the length of its body. It measures just 16–17 cm (including a roughly 4 cm bill), has a wingspan of 24–26 cm and weighs only 34–46 grams. The throat is white, the cheek carries an orange-red spot, the tail is short and cobalt blue, and the legs are coral red. The male's bill is entirely black, while the female shows an orange-red lower mandible — the only reliable way to tell the sexes apart.
It hunts by sitting motionless on a branch one to three metres above clear water, constantly adjusting its position to account for light refraction, before diving vertically with folded wings to reach depths of up to 25 cm; fish are struck against a branch and swallowed head-first. The sharp, piercing flight call — a short "tsiiit" or "tjeej" — often gives the bird away long before it is seen skimming low along the water. In Sweden it breeds mainly in Götaland and Svealand along clear streams, canals and lake edges, with sparser populations in Norrland, and pairs raise two broods between April and July in a 0.5–1 metre tunnel excavated into a vertical clay bank, laying 6–7 white eggs incubated for 19–21 days. With only 2,000–4,000 breeding pairs, the species is classed as Vulnerable (VU) on Sweden's red list — though globally secure, it is highly sensitive to cold winters, which can freeze its fishing waters and cause substantial mortality.
Read about this species in Swedish →