White-browed Scimitar Babbler
Pomatorhinus schisticeps
Doi Luang, Chiang Mai, Thailand
This blog was the outcome of a conversation on “Babblers“ and “Warblers“ I had with friends and birding companions and it sparked the idea to write about the various babblers, warblers, parrotbills, white-eyes, fulvettas, laughingthrushes and their allies. I have featured the Large Scimitar Babbler & the Rusty-cheeked Scimitar Babbler in earlier blogs and this one is about the White-browed Scimitar Babbler from Doi Luang in Chiang Mai, Thailand. To read about my other babblers, I have done a collection here: Old World Babblers.
The Old World Babblers are a family of mostly Old World passerine birds rather diverse in size and coloration, characterised by soft fluffy plumage. These are birds of tropical areas, with the greatest variety in Southeast Asia and the Indian subcontinent. The timaliids are one of two unrelated groups of birds known as babblers, the other being the Australasian babblers of the family Pomatostomidae (also known as pseudo-babblers). Morphological diversity is rather high; most species resemble warblers, jays or thrushes.
“This group is among those Old World bird families with the highest number of species still being discovered. ”
In an earlier blog I have included the genus of passerines known as Pnoepyga endemic to southern and south eastern Asia. The Pnoepyga contains five species with its members known as cupwings or wren-babblers and they have long been placed in the babbler family Timaliidae. But a 2009 study of the DNA of the families Timaliidae and the Old World warblers (Sylviidae) found no support for the placement of the genus in either family, prompting the authors to erect a new monogeneric family, the Pnoepygidae.
These are all part of the superfamily Sylvioidea, one of at least three major clades within the Passerida along with the Muscicapoidea and Passeroidea. It contains about 1300 species including the Old World warblers, Old World babblers, swallows, larks and bulbuls. Members of the clade are found worldwide, with fewer species present in the Americas. Some of the families within the Sylvioidea have been greatly redefined. In particular, the Old World warbler family Sylviidae and Old World babbler family Timaliidae were used as waste-bin taxa and included many species which have turned out not to be closely related. Several new families have been created and some species have been moved from one family to another - to the extent that when I took some of these photos I had different names for them to what they are currently named in this article.
The Babbler group:
Sylviidae: sylviid babblers (34 species)
Paradoxornithidae: parrotbills (37 species)
Zosteropidae: white-eyes (141 species)
Timaliidae: babblers, scimitar babblers (54 species)
Pellorneidae: fulvettas, ground babblers (60 species)
Alcippeidae: Alcippe fulvettas (10 species)
Leiothrichidae: laughingthrushes and allies (133 species)
This list is an extract from the list of 25 families is based on the molecular phylogenetic study published by Silke Fregin and colleagues in 2012 and the revisions of the babbler group by Cai et al (2019) The family sequence and number of species is from the online list of world birds maintained by Frank Gill and David Donsker on behalf of the International Ornithological Committee (IOC).
Illustrated in this blog is one of the Timaliidae from the genus Pomatorhinus I was fortunate to observe and photograph on Doi Luang in Chiang Mai, Thailand. With some birds like the Pygmy Wren-Babbler I got lucky as the bird came in very close and I was able to “fill the frame”. But to be honest, I prefer the photos with some ambience around the bird because it gives an idea of where and in some cases how the bird tends to forage and also allows the subject in the image to breathe.
Timaliidae
Timaliids are small to medium birds. They have strong legs, & many are quite terrestrial. They typically have generalised bills, similar to those of a thrush or warbler, except for the scimitar babblers which, as their name implies, have strongly decurved bills. Most have predominantly brown plumage, with minimal difference between the sexes, but many more brightly coloured species also exist.
This group is not strongly migratory, and most species have short rounded wings, and a weak flight. They live in lightly wooded or scrubland environments, ranging from swamp to near-desert. They are primarily insectivorous, although many will also take berries, and the larger species will even eat small lizards and other vertebrates.
Typical babblers live in communities of around a dozen birds, jointly defending a territory. Many even breed communally, with a dominant pair building a nest, and the remainder helping to defend and rear their young. Young males remain with the group, while females move away to find a new group, and thus avoid inbreeding. They make nests from twigs, and hide them in dense vegetation.
The Timaliids are a family of 56 species divided into the following ten genera: Erythrogenys, Pomatorhinus, Spelaeornis, Stachyris, Cyanoderma, Dumetia, Mixornis, Macronus, Timalia, Melanocichla.
The focus today is on the White-browed Scimitar Babbler which comes in Pomatorhinus - a genus of scimitar babblers, jungle birds with long down curved bills. These are birds of tropical Asia, with the greatest number of species occurring in hills of the Himalayas..
Chiang Mai
The word Chiang itself is from North Thai, or Lanna, meaning town or city and Mai means new making Chiang Mai the New City as it was founded later than Chiang Rai, the earlier capital of King Meng Rai. The districts in the province are called amphoe, and sub-districts are called tambon. Another twist is the use of Nakhon (or Nakorn or Nakhorn), derived from the Sanskrit word Nagara, also means city, though strictly speaking it refers to a capital city such as Nakorn Sri Ayutthaya (more on Ayutthaya later). Indeed to emphasise its former status you may sometimes see Chiang Mai referred to as Nakhon Ping. Other common names of geographical features include mae (river) and doi which is north Thai for mountain - for example Doi Inthanon and Mae Ping.
Doi Luang
In close proximity to the Doi Pha Hom Pok National Park, it is the second highest mountain in Thailand and a part of the Dan Lao Mountain range, northwest of Chiang Mai, sharing the border with Myanmar. Doi Luang & Doi SanJu, can be easily accessed from Fang town. The mountain forest and no traffic make it easy to view birds. The entire area is very quiet, secluded and home to rare species like Mrs. Humes Pheasant, Long–tailed Sibia, Himalayan Cutia, Black–throated Tit, Black–eared Shrike Babbler, Whiskered Yuhina, Crimson–breasted Woodpecker, Fire–tailed Sunbird to name a few.
We didn’t have the good fortune to see all the species on all the mountains, that would have been impossible, but we did rack up quite a number of species - about 95 of them. This gallery is of the White-browed Scimitar Babbler.
White-browed Scimitar Babbler
The White-browed Scimitar Babbler (Pomatorhinus schisticeps) is a species of bird in the family Timaliidae. It is found in Bangladesh, Bhutan, Cambodia, India, Laos, Myanmar, Nepal, Thailand and Vietnam. Its natural habitats are subtropical or tropical moist lowland forest and subtropical or tropical moist montane forest.
The babbler is about 19–23 cm long and weighs about 40 grams. A medium-sized scimitar-babbler, it is olive-brown above and white below, with a long white supercilium, yellow bill and eyes. The nominate race has a slaty grey crown with indistinct blackish shaft streaks, shading on the nape to ochrous olive-brown upperparts. The upperwing and tail are brown; the long supercilium from above the nares to the upper neck side is white, lores, cheek and ear-coverts are blackish, the chin and submoustachial area to mid-belly is white, the neck side down to the breast side and flanks is chestnut, fading to dull ochrous-grey on the lower flanks, thighs and vent. The iris is yellow or pale orange, sometimes lavender or pale red. The bill is yellow with a black base of the upper mandible. The legs are bluish-slate or greenish-slate to brownish and the sexes are similar. The juvenile is duller and paler than the adult, slightly browner above (but reported also as reddish-olive above), with rufous on the forehead, and rusty on the breast and flanks. The race leucogaster is smaller than the nominate, more olive-grey above, with slightly paler and less extensive chestnut on neck and body sides. The race salimalii has blacker crown and ear-coverts; cryptanthus is very slightly more rufous-tinged above, slightly less grey on hind crown, often more rufous on nape. The race mearsi is somewhat slatier on upperparts, with blacker tail while the race nuchalis is slightly smaller and shorter-billed, crown concolorous with upperparts, variably broad or intense rufous extending around nape, and breast side and flanks mostly ochrous-grey with weak rufous-chestnut edges. The race ripponi is very like previous, but almost no trace of rufous on breast side and flanks. The race difficilis is like the last two, but with warmer upperparts, wings and uppertail dark ochraceous rufescent-brown. The race olivaceus resembles nuchalis, but the crown and upperparts are more olive-toned. The race humilis is similar to last but small (19–20 cm), and shorter-billed; annamensis is also similar but has darker crown demarcated from mantle, maroon-chestnut of nape and neck continuing down flanks. And finally the race klossi has an olive crown and the upperparts are somewhat more rufous-tinged.
SUBSPECIES
Pomatorhinus schisticeps leucogaster - Distributed in Northern India from Kangra (Himachal Pradesh) East to Garhwal (Uttarakhand).
Pomatorhinus schisticeps schisticeps - Distributed in Kumaon (Uttarakhand) East to North East India (Central Arunachal Pradesh).
Pomatorhinus schisticeps salimalii - Distributed in the Mishmi Hills, in East Arunachal Pradesh (North East India).
Pomatorhinus schisticeps cryptanthus - Distributed in Meghalaya, South Assam, Nagaland and North Manipur (North East India) South at least to NE Bangladesh.
Pomatorhinus schisticeps mearsi - Distributed in West and Central Myanmar (West of River Irrawaddy).
Pomatorhinus schisticeps ripponi - Distributed in Central (Mogok) and North East Myanmar, North West Thailand and North West Laos.
Pomatorhinus schisticeps nuchalis - Distributed in Central and South East Myanmar (East of River Irrawaddy).
Pomatorhinus schisticeps difficilis - Distributed in South Myanmar (including North Tenasserim) and adjacent North West Thailand.
Pomatorhinus schisticeps olivaceus - Distributed in Lowlands of South Myanmar and peninsular Thailand
Pomatorhinus schisticeps humilis - Distributed in North and East Thailand, South Laos and Vietnam (Central Annam).
Pomatorhinus schisticeps klossi - Distributed in South East Thailand and South West Cambodia.
Pomatorhinus schisticeps annamensis - Distributed in extreme East Cambodia and South Vietnam (South Annam, North Cochinchina).
Pomatorhinus schisticeps fastidiosus - Distributed in the Malay Peninsula (South Myanmar and Isthmus of Kra to Trang)
The White-browed Scimitar Babbler is a resident bird in its range and favours dense undergrowth in deciduous and evergreen broadleaf forest, secondary growth, well-wooded ravines, mixed bamboo forest, scrub-jungle, and grassland. It is found to 2650 m in India, 245–1500 m in Nepal, 400–1590 m in Bhutan, up to 2600 m in SE Asia.
It feeds on insects, small seeds and berries and is found in pairs during the breeding season. Otherwise they are usually seen in small parties, joining mixed feeding flocks which often contain other scimitar-babblers and, in Bhutan with the Lesser Necklaced Laughingthrush (Garrulax monileger) and the Greater Necklaced Laughingthrush (Garrulax pectoralis). It forages on the ground, hops in undergrowth and ascends trees.
The White-browed Scimitar Babbler is not globally threatened and listed as Least Concern. It is frequent in Nepal up to 915 m, then rare to 1500 m. It is local but frequently recorded in Bhutan. In India, it is fairly common in W Himalayas up to 1500 m, becoming locally common in E up to 2000 m; fairly common in Kalesar Wildlife Sanctuary (Haryana), rare on the New Forest campus at Dehradun and uncommon in the Dehradun valley (Uttaranchal). It is common in Nameri National Park and uncommon in the Kaziranga National Park (Assam), and present elsewhere in NE India in (at least) Buxa Tiger Reserve (West Bengal), Eaglenest Wildlife Sanctuary and Mouling National Park (Arunachal Pradesh) and Balphakram National Park (Meghalaya). The White-browed Scimitar Babbler is generally fairly common to common in its South East Asian range. It is common in the Khao Yai and Kaeng Krachan National Parks, in Thailand. Common (at least before 1970) at Bokor and in Cardomom Mts, in Cambodia. Occasional in Xe Pian National Biodiversity Conservation Area (NBCA), Phou Xang He NBCA, Dong Hua Sao NBCA and Phou Dendin NBCA, in Laos, and present in Phou Khaokhoay, Nakai-Nam Theun and Hin Namno NBCAs. In Vietnam, present in Thuong Da Nhim and Chu Yang Sin Nature Reserves (Da Lat Plateau, in S Annam), and in five protected areas in the Annamese lowlands, although scarce in Nam Bai Cat Tien National Park (Cochinchina).
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This is but a glimpse into the beautiful world of the babblers and the tremendous variety in the species and that they are still being discovered. Do subscribe if you liked what you saw and if you would like to continue to read these insights into the beautiful birds and animals inhabiting our planet.
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