Tooth-billed pigeon

The tooth-billed pigeon (Didunculus strigirostris), also known as the manumea, is a large pigeon found only in Samoa. It is the only living species of genus Didunculus. A related extinct species, the Tongan tooth-billed pigeon (Didunculus placopedetes), is only known from subfossil remains in several archeological sites in Tonga. The tooth-billed pigeon is the national bird of Samoa and featured on the 20 tālā bills and the 50 sene pieces of the 2008/2011 series. Native only to Samoa's primary rainforest, it is considered to be endangered, with only a few hundred individuals thought to remain in existence.

The tooth-billed pigeon is a medium-sized, approximately 31 cm long, dark pigeon with reddish feet and red bare skin around the eye. The underparts, head and neck are greyish with a slight blue-green iridescence, and the tail, wings-coverts and tertials are rufous chestnut, while the remaining remiges are blackish. It has a large, curved, and hooked bright red bill, with tooth-like projections on the lower mandible which let them act as seed dispensers. The sexes are similar in appearance, but the juvenile is duller, with a browner head, and a black bill with pale orange at the base. Behaviourally, it is unusual – perhaps unique – among members of Columbiformes in drinking by scooping water up in its bill, in the manner of the great majority of bird species, rather than sucking it up using the tongue as a straw.