Todies Kingfishers Hoopoes and Relatives: Coraciiformes

Coraciiforms eat small animals, especially small vertebrates, or animals with a backbone, (such as fishes, reptiles, amphibians, and small mammals), and invertebrates, or animals without a backbone (such as insects, worms, and crustaceans). For instance, the shovel-billed kingfisher eats mainly earthworms. Some species, such as many forest hornbills, eat fruit and berries as their primary source of food, only adding meat when raising their young.

Although most species search for food within trees, some species hunt for food on the ground. They catch their prey primarily by dropping down to the ground from a perch (as with true rollers and bee-eaters) or into water (as with kingfishers). When birds drop down to their prey, they may hover while targeting onto food (as in kingfishers), or they may take the food as they fly (as in bee-eaters and broad-billed rollers). Some families, such as todies and motmots, use both terrestrial (on the ground) and aerial (in the air) techniques for the capture of prey. A few species gather their food while they walk or run about on the ground, such as the common hoopoes and some African hornbills.