The eastern crowned warbler (''Phylloscopus coronatus'') is a species of

Old World warbler Old World warblers are a large group of birds formerly grouped together in the bird family Sylviidae. The family held over 400 species in over 70 genera, and were the source of much taxonomic confusion. Two families were split out initially, the ci ...

in the family

Phylloscopidae Leaf warblers are small insectivorous passerine birds belonging to the genus ''Phylloscopus''. Leaf warblers were formerly included in the Old World warbler family but are now considered to belong to the family Phylloscopidae, introduced in 20 ...

. It inhabits boreal and temperate forests in the east

Palearctic The Palearctic or Palaearctic is the largest of the eight biogeographic realms of the Earth. It stretches across all of Eurasia north of the foothills of the Himalayas, and North Africa. The realm consists of several bioregions: the Euro-Sibe ...

Description

The eastern crowned warbler is a medium-sized, rather robust and brightly coloured leaf warbler. It is dark olive-green above and white below with a strong head pattern of dark, grey lateral crown stripes with an indistinct yellowish median crown stripe. It also has a long yellowish-white supercilium with a dark stripe through the eye and dark lores and dusky yellow cheeks. It has a single pale wingbar. The square tail shows a slight fork. It has quite a strong, robust, pale-coloured bill and dark legs.

Distribution

The eastern crowned warbler breeds in eastern

Siberia Siberia ( ; rus, Сибирь, r=Sibir', p=sʲɪˈbʲirʲ, a=Ru-Сибирь.ogg) is an extensive geographical region, constituting all of North Asia, from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east. It has been a part of ...

from the Argun River eastwards and southwards into western

Manchuria Manchuria is an exonym (derived from the endo demonym " Manchu") for a historical and geographic region in Northeast Asia encompassing the entirety of present-day Northeast China (Inner Manchuria) and parts of the Russian Far East (Outer Manc ...

and into central Szechwan, the

Korean Peninsula Korea ( ko, 한국, or , ) is a peninsular region in East Asia. Since 1945, it has been divided at or near the 38th parallel, with North Korea (Democratic People's Republic of Korea) comprising its northern half and South Korea (Republic o ...

and Japan. It winters in south-east Asia from eastern India and Bangladesh to

Java Java (; id, Jawa, ; jv, ꦗꦮ; su, ) is one of the Greater Sunda Islands in Indonesia. It is bordered by the Indian Ocean to the south and the Java Sea to the north. With a population of 151.6 million people, Java is the world's List ...

. It has occurred as a vagrant in western Europe with the first record for Great Britain being in

County Durham County Durham ( ), officially simply Durham,UK General Acts 1997 c. 23Lieutenancies Act 1997 Schedule 1(3). From legislation.gov.uk, retrieved 6 April 2022. is a ceremonial county in North East England.North East Assembly �About North East E ...

in 2009; this was the fifth record for the

Western Palearctic The Western Palaearctic or Western Palearctic is part of the Palaearctic realm, one of the eight biogeographic realms dividing the Earth's surface. Because of its size, the Palaearctic is often divided for convenience into two, with Europe, North ...

(UK and Scandinavia).

Habitat and biology

The eastern crowned warbler is found in open woodland, either mixed or deciduous, at the lower and middle altitudes of mountains, although in the northern part of their range they inhabit dense

taiga Taiga (; rus, тайга́, p=tɐjˈɡa; relates to Mongolic and Turkic languages), generally referred to in North America as a boreal forest or snow forest, is a biome characterized by coniferous forests consisting mostly of pines, spruce ...

. Wintering birds occur in open woodland, deep jungle and mangroves. This is an arboreal species but it will forage quite low down in vegetation and will join mixed flocks of other small birds in the winter and in the breeding season. The species is often located by its frequent singing. It readily flycatches by sallying out from a perch to catch insects in flight.

Etymology

The genus name ''Phylloscopus'' is from

Ancient Greek Ancient Greek includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Dark Ages (), the Archaic peri ...

''phullon'', "leaf", and ''skopos'', "seeker" (from ''skopeo'', "to watch"). The specific ''coronatus'' is from

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...

and means "crowned".

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q2869566 eastern crowned warbler Birds of East Asia eastern crowned warbler Taxonomy articles created by Polbot