Blue-winged Laughingthrush + Birds of the Week Invitation LX

When I spotted the Blue-winged laughingthrush (Trochalopteron squamatum) my first thought was that the Latin name made more sense than the English “common” name. Squamatum is a Latin word that means scaly, and it describes the overall look of the bird much better. But in its range, from central Nepal to northern Vietnam, it is probably better known by its English and Chinese name. The Chinese name 蓝翅噪鹛 (lán chì zào méi) also picks on the supposedly blue wing.

This was my second experience birding from a hide. A few of us were sitting in a hide in eastern Sikkim, waiting for some of the rarer birds of the area. We’d spotted a lone specimen skulking at the edge of a clearing further away. The undergrowth in front of the hide had been taken over by the fearless Chestnut-headed laughingthrush (T. erythrocephalum ). Suddenly, this bird appeared in the middle of a bunch of its cousins, and posed for a short while to give me a decent shot.

It raised so many questions! I’d thought T. squamatum would be gregarious, like T. erythrocephalum, or the larger group to which they belong, namely the babbler-like birds. Why was this alone? This region of the world is rich in laughingthrushes and their relatives, and I wondered why there is such a diversity of closely related species here. Do they feed on different things? Is that how a base species radiated into many niches and diversified? Unlike Darwin’s finches, these are not geographically isolated, unless glaciers and other climatic changes are implicated. Meaty questions. I’m sure there are literally hundreds of working scientists thinking and writing about all this.

---

There aren’t many places on WordPress where bird watchers can share posts. If you post any photos of birds this week (starting today and up to next Monday), it would be great if you could leave a link in the comments, or a pingback, for others to follow. You don’t have to post a recent photo, nor do you have to post a photo of the same bird as mine, but do use the tag “Bird of the Week” to help others find your post. For more information see the main landing page for this invitation.

Birds of the Week LIX