Forest Wagtail

Identification

This is a distinctive wagtail, the only one placed in the genus Dendronanthus (all other wagtails are placed in Motacilla). The forest wagtail is 18 cm (7.1 in) in length, a slender bird with a long tail. The back and crown are olive brown, and the wings are black with two yellow wing bars and white tertial edges. There is a white supercilium, above a dark stripe through the eye. The underparts are white, apart from a black double breast band. The upper breast band is bib-like while the lower band is often broken. The sexes are similar in appearance. Young birds are more yellowish on the underside.<p>The forest wagtail has a single-note call ('pink pink') given often while on the ground or even in high flight. In addition, the birds have a soft lilting song. The brown shrike (Lanius cristatus confusus) sometimes imitates the calls of the forest wagtail.

Taxonomy

The forest wagtail was formally described in 1789 by the German naturalist Johann Friedrich Gmelin in his revised and expanded edition of Carl Linnaeus's Systema Naturae. He placed it with the wagtails in the genus Motacilla and coined the binomial name Motacilla indica. The specific epithet is from Latin indicus meaning "Indian". Gmelin based his account on "La Bergeronnette gris des Indes" that had been described in 1782 by the French naturalist Pierre Sonnerat. The forest wagtail is now the only species placed in the genus Dendronanthus that was introduced in 1844 by the English zoologist Edward Blyth. The name Dendronanthus combines the Ancient Greek dendron meaning "tree" with the genus Anthus that was introduced for the pipits by Johann Matthäus Bechstein in 1805. The species is monotypic: no subspecies are recognised.

Scientific name

Dendronanthus indicus

Authority

(Gmelin, JF, 1789)

Order

Passeriformes

Family

Motacillidae

Genus

Dendronanthus

Range and habitat

As its English and scientific names imply, this is a forest species, a distinction from all other wagtails. It is usually found in open areas of the woodland such as clearings. In winter it is found mainly in well-shaded forest habitats or along paths in coffee plantations and clearings in forests.<p>The breeding areas are in eastern Asia, parts of Korea, parts of China (Gansu, Anhui, Hunan) and parts of Siberia. Southern records of breeding from Assam have been questioned. It migrates to the warmer parts of Asia in winter and it has been suggested that they reach southern India and Sri Lanka via the Andaman Islands. It has been recorded as a vagrant in the Maldives and Australia.<p>It was formerly thought to winter only in southwestern India, passing through the rest of the peninsula on migration. But now it has been shown to winter in all of the southern part of the peninsula in addition to southwestern India.

Breeding range

PAL : se Russia and ne China to se China

Non-breeding range

to India, Philippines and Indonesia

Migration

Complete migrants

Behavior

These wagtails are found singly or in small groups. They often forage in the trees and capture insects along the branches of trees. They may also forage on the ground like a pipit and when disturbed, it flies up into the trees with a sharp pink note. They can climb steep branches and will run rapidly along horizontal branches. They roost in the company of other wagtails among reeds.

Conservation

Population trend

stable