The Widespread Inexperienced Magpie appears something however frequent. (I swear I got here up with this sentence myself however later noticed that Australian Geographic has a webpage titled “The frequent inexperienced magpie is something however”, which robs me of my illusions of being an unique thinker).

In accordance with the eBird description, it’s every little thing I’m not: a “neon-colored, noisy, extremely social fowl”. Shudder to assume (not the fowl half although).

Subsequent, this publish has an extended part on babblers, a really ill-defined class of birds. However a few of them look fairly attention-grabbing.

If the White-crested Laughingthrush just isn’t obtainable, generally White-hooded Babblers take their place in Wham! movies (see Birding Hongbenghe half 1 to grasp this obscure and never excellent joke).

Sadly, juvenile White-hooded Babblers don’t look cool and hedonistic sufficient but, so they’re normally excluded from these movies.

Apparently, these juveniles look extra just like one other species, the Pale-billed Parrotbill, than the grownup babblers – they usually generally are a part of the identical flock. An attention-grabbing paper discusses the visible convergence of species in multi-species flocks whereas an internet web page has a hanging picture displaying the similarity of two species, one a cutia and one a sibia (picture by Wenyi Zhou, together with his permission).

Right here is the Sibia – the Rufuous-backed Sibia, to be particular – as seen at Hongbenghe.

One proposed rationalization by the researchers for this phenomenon is that similar-looking birds cut back their threat of predation, as predators discover it tougher to deal with and isolate a single goal. My various principle is that the birds are simply following trend, imitating whoever is the best. It was like that once I went to highschool, why wouldn’t it work for birds …

Should you noticed a paper titled “Highway Crossing by Birds in a Tropical Forest in Northern Vietnam”, would you – like me – additionally instantly visualize cute tiny site visitors lights and small birds lining up and ready in entrance of them? Then we’re each hopeless … Anyway, the paper assessments whether or not small roads in a forest are a hindrance to birds – are they reluctant to cross? (not due to the ready time because the examine doesn’t really contain tiny site visitors lights, sadly). They discovered that for understory birds just like the Puff-throated Babbler, these roads are certainly a hindrance.

(If you wish to see how this species builds its nest, see right here.)

These roads are a lot much less of a hindrance for the Pin-striped Tit-babbler, a mid-story fowl.

That species is apparently liable to extinction in Singapore – not as a result of it’s so uncommon, however as a result of its genetic range is so low. Consider that earlier than sleeping together with your sister.

(Beginning lyrics of “Razzmatazz”, a superb tune by Pulp: “The issue together with your brother / he’s at all times sleeping together with your mom”).

In accordance with Wikipedia, “scimitar babblers are rangy, medium-sized, floppy-tailed land birds with tender fluffy plumage. They’ve sturdy legs and are fairly terrestrial. … [They] have lengthy, downward-curved payments, used to work by means of the leaf litter … They’re sometimes lengthy tailed, darkish brown above, and white or orange-brown beneath. Many have hanging head patterns, with a broad black band by means of the attention, bordered with white above and beneath. Most scimitar babblers are jungle species, tough to look at within the dense vegetation they like, however like different babblers, these are noisy birds …”

My private favourite is the Massive Scimitar-Babbler, which eBird calls a “good-looking and barely primal-looking babbler” (you possibly can kind of think about this fowl as being saved as a pet by some cartoonish stone-age individuals – “Fred Flintstone and the Massive Scimitar-Babbler”, maybe?).

Not like me, the HBW doesn’t appear to understand the species a lot, stating that it’s “hopping about in very ungainly method.”

That is then adopted by a fairly ungainly description of the species’ vocalization, which I’ll quote in full regardless of the chance of being sued:

“Music a geographically and individually variable sequence of normally 3 brief, syncopated, loud, hole notes, the upper notes candy and sad-sounding, typically from duetting pairs, e.g. “wiu-pu-pu—wup-up-piu, wiu-pu-pu—wo-hu, whiu-pu-pu—whip-up-up”, “wiao-pu-pu—hu-pwuhu” and comparable; particular person phrase variants embrace “oh-pu”, “whiu-wao” and hurried “wiupupu” and “whipuwup”, and so on. Famous additionally as a easy, low, throaty “tyonk-tyonk-tyonk”, the notes equivalent; a duetted “gul-díyá, gup”; “gru-grugyúp”, generally combined with “gru-grugwééyu”; a low “greo-greo, hwéeo-wup-wup”; “wulchéwpit” (one fowl) after which “wildéwdit” (different fowl), the second barely thinner and better; “gu-gu-gruu, kúú”, final word (by second fowl) stage and bell-like. Name in agitation a loud, harsh, grating rattle, beginning with vehement upward-inflected hiss, e.g. “fwíí-ke-ke-ke-ke-ke-ke-ke-ke-ke” or “whít-tchtchtchtch”, softer and barely slower close to finish; additionally a brief, laborious “puh”.”

Don’t despair should you want smaller Scimitar-Babblers – evolution has developed a number of alternate options for you. Just like the Coral-billed Scimitar-Babbler …

… and the Streak-breasted Scimitar-babbler.

Would you utilize extra sunscreen lotion when going up a mountain than when staying at sea stage? That might be sensible, I suppose – and so evolution has taught the Rufous-capped Babbler to do the identical.

Apparently, the plumage of Rufous-capped Babblers occupying montane habitats had increased UV-reflectance and brightness than that of lowland birds, comparable to the upper UV depth in montane than lowland background gentle environments (word: the photographs present Buff-chested Babbler, which I solely realized belatedly).

A barely extra readable account of this phenomenon could be discovered right here.

The Gray-throated Babbler just isn’t notably shy and thus pretty simple to take photographs of.

Whereas the Streaked Wren-babbler is likely one of the fowl species that make grown-up fowl photographers cry.

Presumably instantly after studying “The Lord of the Rings”, an eBird author got here up with the next description of the Gray Peacock-pheasant: “A wierd-looking pheasant which passes ghostlike by means of dense forests”.

The HBW helpfully provides that the fowl is never present in massive flocks – although they put it a bit in another way: ” Often discovered alone, in pairs, or in small household events.”

The web site www.jwcpheasants.com appears to endorse polygamy for this species regardless of this being unlawful within the USA for different animals akin to people. The positioning states that in captivity, “two hens could be paired with one male.”

Having recovered from studying Tolkien, eBird is a bit much less mysterious concerning the Rufous-throated Partridge: “A gorgeous little gamebird of foothill and highland forests … Brightly-colored, even for a partridge”.

Like people, it’s “apparently monogamous” (HBW), which to me sounds a bit uncertain.

The Silver Pheasant appears a bit just like typical Chinese language (and in contrast to me) in liking noise and disturbance (I’m scripting this throughout Chinese language New 12 months, a interval in time when the bizarre obsession of the Chinese language with noisy fireworks is especially apparent).

Not less than in Patagonia, the place this species has been launched: “The Silver Pheasant used rather more often areas with a excessive stage of disturbance, suggesting that the presence of disturbed habitats might facilitate institution and unfold of this species in Patagonia.” (supply). A weirdo, that fowl – who likes individuals?

Then once more, it appears they thrive in captivity – see right here for particulars.

eBird calls the Hill Blue Flycatcher a “medium-sized complicated flycatcher”, which in itself is a bit complicated as there is no such thing as a clear rationale for calling the species complicated.

What is perhaps complicated is the scientific species identify whitei as there are seven totally different individuals named White who all gave names to birds.

On this case, the right one (based on the HBW) is Sir Herbert Thirkell White (1855-1931), a British colonial administrator in Burma. He additionally wrote some books on Burma, certainly one of which (“A Civil Servant in Burma”) Wikipedia calls a basic. As this ebook was printed in 1913, it’s now freely obtainable on-line and you’ll learn sentences akin to “The Burman has no head, and succumbs directly to a relatively small amount of liquor” with out violating any copyright legal guidelines.

Nonetheless, stated ebook solely comprises the phrase “fowl” 4 instances, twice not even which means actual birds (“mechanical singing birds”, “a uncommon fowl” referring to Burmese officers who should not corrupt), and twice in a fairly peripheral method (“he shot birds on the wing”, “the consumption of flesh of birds”), which makes naming a fowl species after him a wierd alternative.

The Pale Blue Flycatcher just isn’t notably uniformly coloured, regardless of its scientific identify unicolor.

To cite eBird: “Male is pale blue total with a pale grey stomach”

You could find a cute little commentary on sleeping Widespread Tailorbirds right here. (word: the picture exhibits Darkish-necked Tailorbird).

The observer notes that the tailorbirds usually had been sleeping peacefully on his balcony however “not once I was watching sure motion pictures that concerned fierce predators (horror film for the tailorbirds). I as soon as watched “Twilight: New Moon” on my laptop and instantly the tailorbirds awoke and chirped, hopped round in stress till I realised that they should have assumed that the werewolf within the present that had been designed to seem like actual wolfs as a risk. I lowered the amount and after some time they bought used to it and slowly went again to sleep.”

So, lesson discovered: tailorbirds don’t recognize horror motion pictures.

In Gray-backed Shrikes (no less than these breeding on the Tibetan plateau), the eggs laid throughout one breeding try get bigger with time – presumably an try and no less than partly overcome the disadvantages the final chick faces (supply). That is in distinction to different species during which the later chicks typically primarily function meals for the sooner ones.

Occupied with doing analysis on the Orange-bellied Leafbird?

Here’s what the HBW lists as priorities for future analysis:

“The taxonomic identification of Orange-bellied Leafbird in lots of areas stay to be investigated. The inhabitants in south-central Vietnam, together with Da Lat Plateau, is provisionally included in C. h. melliana however would possibly characterize an undescribed subspecies. There are additionally studies of people with intermediate traits between the very totally different taxa C. h. hardwickii and C. h. melliana from alleged contact zone(s) in northern Laos and presumably south-western China. Hill ranges in jap Myanmar and western Thailand are additionally suspected to be the intergradation zone between C. h. hardwickii and C. h. malayana, albeit broadly assigned the previous, as small-sized people resembling pure C. h. malayana had been collected. Extra genetic analysis and thorough phenotypic examination on populations in these areas are required.”

Or higher follow your present job as a door-to-door salesperson for vacuum cleaners.

The species can also be hunted for native consumption in Meghalaya (India), based on the HBW.

For my part, eBird is a bit unfair to the feminine Rufous-bellied Niltava.

The positioning says “the male is brilliantly coloured …

… whereas the feminine is drab brown total”

I believe the tiny white and bluish bits of the feminine are fairly engaging – possibly eBird ought to recognize refined magnificence a bit extra.

Then once more, the HBW appears to disregard the feminine altogether, simply calling the species a “massive, stocky and brightly coloured flycatcher”.