Buff-bellied Monarch

A graceful aerial feeder found over a wide variety of open habitats, especially near water, including marshes and towns. Often seen on exposed perches including power and telephone lines in villages. Commonly found in flocks of up to twenty birds, sometimes mixing with other swallows and martins. Note the male’s diagnostic glossy purple-blue plumage and snow-white belly. Females and immatures are similarly patterned, but have brown mixed with the blue and are probably not safely separable from Cuban Martin. Female and immature Purple Martins are very similar, but they often have a scaly breast and finely streaked belly, with less contrast between belly and chest. Notably, Cuban and Purple Martins are not present in this species’ range from March to September. Calls include a harsh “churr,” a buzzy “zwick-zwick,” and a musical buzzy burbling.

The smallest loon, with a slender neck and bill. Often holds the thin bill at an upward angle. In breeding plumage, note smooth gray head, brick-red throat, and dark back. In winter, dark cap and hind neck contrast with white face and throat. In flight, often lowers and raises head more than other loons; also note small feet. Juveniles can look quite dark with a smudgy gray neck and limited white throat. Often confused with other loons, especially Pacific and Arctic; note overall head and bill shape and less sharp contrast to the head pattern. Breeds on ponds in the Arctic tundra. Winters primarily on saltwater, but can use large lakes and reservoirs in migration. Sometimes gathers in loose flocks where food is plentiful.

Medium-sized gamebird endemic to the northeastern Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau, where it inhabits rocky hillsides and valley slopes with grassy or sparse brushy cover. Very similar to the much more widespread and closely related Chukar, but note present species’ pale lores and slightly different head and neck patterning: the dark band that runs down the neck is extensively warm tawny-brown, and forms an extremely thin, almost broken collar (Chukar has a black band that forms a thick, solid collar). Often forages in dense vegetation, breaking cover to give its accelerating clucking song or to survey territory; in winter, may come down to settlements in areas where not hunted intensively.