Rusty Flowerpiercer

Slightly smaller version of the familiar cartoon Greater Roadrunner, but usually the two species do not occur in the same places. Favors dry brushy woodland and overgrown weedy fields in tropical lowlands and foothills. Can be very elusive, but at other times runs out in the road or sits quietly sunning itself on a fence post or bush top in the early morning. Note that the center of the throat and breast are plain rich buffy, without the dense dark streaking of Greater Roadrunner.

Nondescript leaf warbler with two whitish wing bars (often only one visible), dull to bright greenish upperparts, a yellow wash usually restricted to the face, and a pale orange lower bill. Breeds in forest in the Caucasus mountains. Winters primarily in southern India, where it largely overlaps with the similar-looking Greenish Warbler. Although separable from Greenish Warbler by its greener upperparts, yellow on face, and the second wingbar (when present), Green is best identified by its loud, fast, trisyllabic “chi-su-wi” call.

Tiny songbird of mountain and hill forests; ranges from the Himalayas south to the Malay Peninsula on the Asian mainland, with an isolated population in Taiwan’s highlands. Adult male is dark blue above and pale creamy white below, with a black stripe leading down the belly from a brilliantly red patch like a bloodstain on the breast. Female is much plainer, brownish-olive above and off-white below; lacks the bright white throat of Plain and female Scarlet-backed Flowerpeckers. Often forages at flowers blooming in the canopy. Gives a high, thin, up-and-down “tsee’ip, tsee’ip, tsee’ip” and a rising series of ticks (often ending with more metallic notes); calls include dry tick notes and high, thin “tseet”s.