White-browed Fantail

Rhipidura aureola

Fantail with a broad white eyebrow, dark upperparts, and white underparts. Crown and ear-coverts black, contrasting with white eyebrows. Throat mottled black-and-white. Pair of wingbars formed by well-separated white teardrop-shaped spots. Female slightly paler with a browner head. Immature like adult, but has rufous tips to dark feathers of upperparts. Frequent song is a 4- to 7-note melodious whistling phrase that ascends and then sometimes descends or is left incomplete. Contact call is a harsh “switch-wich.” Inhabits dry, open wooded habitats, ranging from dry deciduous forest to scrubby agricultural edges.

Identification

The adult white-browed fantail is about 18 cm long. It has dark brown upperparts, with white spots on the wings, and whitish underparts. The fan-shaped tail is edged in white, and the long white supercilia meet on the forehead. The throat and eyemask are blackish and border whitish moustachial stripes.

Taxonomy

Genus: Rhipidura; Family: Rhipiduridae; Order: Passeriformes.

Scientific name
Rhipidura aureola
Authority
Lesson, RP, 1831
Order
Passeriformes
Family
Rhipiduridae
Genus
Rhipidura

Range and habitat

The white-browed fantail breeds across tropical regions of the Indian Subcontinent and Southeast Asia. The species ranges from eastern Pakistan to southern Indochina. It is found in forest and other woodland.

Migration
Resident species

Behavior

Migration pattern: Resident species.

Conservation

Population trend: stable.

Population trend
stable

Photos

Distribution

Bird Calls

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