Definition of "cock-of-the-rock" []

• Either of two South American birds (Rupicola rupicola or R. peruviana) having a distinctive crest and bright-orange or reddish plumage in the male. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "A male Andean cock-of-the-rock (Rupicola peruviana) displays in the cloud forest to attract a nearby female."
• "The cloud forest supports a wide diversity of fauna with such notable species as turkey vulture Cathartes aura, Andean guan Penelope montagnii, scarlet-fronted parakeet Aratinga wagleri, lyre-tailed nightjar Uropsalis lyra, marvellous spatuletail Loddigesia mirabilis (VU), cock-of-the-rock Rupicola peruviana, carbonated flower-piercer Diglossa carbonaria and hepatic tanager Piranga flava (Mittermeier, de Macedo and Luscombe, 1975)."
• "A day or two after, my hunter brought me a specimen of the green gaper (Calyptomena viridis), which is like a small cock-of-the-rock, but entirely of the most vivid green, delicately marked on the wings with black bars."