The Nilgiri laughingthrush (''Montecincla cachinnans'') is a species of
laughingthrush endemic to the high elevation areas of the
Nilgiris
The Nilgiri Mountains form part of the Western Ghats in northwestern Tamil Nadu, Southern Karnataka, and eastern Kerala in India. They are located at the trijunction of three states and connect the Western Ghats with the Eastern Ghats. At le ...
and adjoining hill ranges in
Peninsular India. The mostly rufous underparts, olive brown upperparts, a prominent white eyebrow and a black throat make it unmistakable. It is easily detected by its loud series of nasal call notes and can be hard to spot when it is hidden away inside a patch of dense vegetation. The species has a confusing
taxonomic history, leading to a range of names. In the past the species was considered to have two subspecies, the nominate form in the Nilgiris (earlier called the black-chinned laughingthrush or rufous-breasted laughingthrush) and ''jerdoni'' (which is now treated as a full species, the
Banasura laughingthrush) with a grey upper breast and found in the
Brahmagiris of
Coorg and Banasura range of
Wayanad
Wayanad () is a district in the north-east of Indian state Kerala with administrative headquarters at the municipality of Kalpetta. It is the only plateau in Kerala. The Wayanad Plateau forms a continuation of the Mysore Plateau, the southern ...
. They are omnivorous, feeding on a range of insects, berries and nectar.
Taxonomy
![TrochalopteronJerdoniSmit](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4d/TrochalopteronJerdoniSmit.jpg)
The species was
described by the English zoologist
Thomas Jerdon in 1839 under the
binomial name ''Crateroptus cachinnans''. In 1872 he noted that the form ''Trochalopteron jerdoni'' that he had discovered on the peak of
Banasura
Bana, also referred to as Banasura (), is an asura king in Hindu mythology, ruling from the city of Śoṇitapura. He is described to be the son of Mahabali. His tale of battling Krishna is described in the Bhagavata Purana.
Legend
A mighty ...
Banasorein Wayanad would likely also occur in Coorg. He added that they were separated by lower hills despite being only about 50 to 60 miles from the western edge of the Nilgiris. The species ''jerdoni'' included ''fairbanki'' and ''meridionale'' (both from south of the Palghat Gap) while ''cachinnans'' was kept separate. This treatment of ''jerdoni'' and ''cachinnans'' as species continued until 2005 when Rasmussen and Anderton grouped the black-chinned forms north of the Palghat Gap into one species with ''jerdoni'' of Coorg-Wynaad treated as a subspecies of ''cachinnans''. The wider distribution of the taxon made the older name of "Nilgiri laughing-thrush" inappropriate. The form south of the Palghat gap without a black chin was elevated to a full species, ''fairbanki'' with ''meridionale'' as a subspecies, and called the
Kerala laughingthrush.
Stuart Baker in the second edition of the ''
Fauna of British India'' included a subspecies ''cinnamomeum'' described by
William Ruxton Davison
William Ruxton Davison (died 25 January 1893) was a British ornithologist and collector. Davison was born in Burma but grew up mainly in Ootacamund in southern India. He worked as a private collector and museum curator for Allan Octavian Hume be ...
from two specimens obtained by Atholl Macgregor, British Resident in Travancore, from an unknown location. This is usually not recognized but the description was based on two specimens with the black of the chin and lores replaced by dark brown.
Stuart Baker used several genera for the south Indian laughingthrushes. ''Trochalopteron'' was said to have the nostril visible and not covered by overhanging bristles as in ''Ianthocincla'', the genus in which the
Wayanad laughingthrush
The Wayanad laughingthrush (''Pterorhinus delesserti'') is a species of laughingthrush in the family Leiothrichidae. It is endemic to the Western Ghats south of Goa in India. These laughingthrushes move in groups in dense forests, producing l ...
was placed. Subsequent revision by Ripley and Ali lumped all the south Indian laughingthrushes into the single genus ''Garrulax''. The genus splits were, however, reinstated on the basis of differences in structure and the species was included in a previously erected genus ''Trochalopteron''.
A detailed phylogenetic study published in 2017 identified that the south Indian species that were included in ''Trochalopteron'' were best treated as a sister group of a clade that included ''Leiothrix'', ''Minla'', ''Heterophasia'' and ''Actinodura'' and they were not closely related to members of ''Trochalopteron'' in the strict sense. This led to a need to establish a new genus ''Montecincla'' (with the type species being the first described species, ''Montecincla cachinnans'').
Description
This laughingthrush is about 24 cm long with a rufous underside and a dark olive grey upper body. The crown is slaty brown and there is a jagged and broad white supercilium margined with black. The throat, lores and a streak behind the eye are black. The tail is olive brown. The iris is reddish brown and the legs and bill are black. The upper breast is grey in the subspecies ''jerdoni'' and can appear somewhat like ''fairbanki'' although the throat of the latter is grey and the two do not overlap in range.
[ It is unmistakable in plumage although at a quick glance it can be mistaken for an Indian scimitar babbler.
]
Behaviour and ecology
The Nilgiri laughingthrush lives in dense forest patches on the Nilgiri and Wayanad ranges above the elevation of . It forages along the forest edge singly or in small groups low in the trees and sometimes on the ground. They are active in the early morning and late afternoon and are extremely vocal. While one bird calls in a series of loud ascending and descending nasal notes, another in a nearby bush produces a series of sharp ''kek'' notes. They feed on the nectar of ''Lobelia excelsa'' and ''Rhododendron'' in winter. When ''Strobilanthes'' is in bloom, the birds feed on its nectar as well as its petals. They feed on the fruits of ''Ilex
''Ilex'' (), or holly, is a genus of over 570 species of flowering plants in the family Aquifoliaceae, and the only living genus in that family. ''Ilex'' has the most species of any woody dioecious angiosperm genus. The species are evergreen o ...
'' spp., '' Solanum auriculatum'', ''Eurya japonica
''Eurya japonica'', known as East Asian eurya, is a 1–3.5 m tall shrub in the Pentaphylacaceae family found in eastern China, Korea, and Japan. It is used as an ornamental plant.
In shinto
Shinto () is a religion from Japan. Classified ...
'', '' Rhamnus wightii'', '' Pyrus baccata'', ''Rubus
''Rubus'' is a large and diverse genus of flowering plants in the rose family, Rosaceae, subfamily Rosoideae, with over 1,350 species.
Raspberries, blackberries, and dewberries are common, widely distributed members of the genus. Most of the ...
'' spp., '' Mahonia leschenaultii'' and '' Rhodomyrtus tomentosa'' ("hill guava"). Insects are crushed before swallowing and sometimes battered against a hard substrate. Small tree-frogs are sometimes taken. Large fruits are sometimes held under their foot and torn apart. They tend to forage on the open ground at dawn and dusk and mostly glean from vegetation during the rest of the day.
The Nilgiri laughingthrush nests from February to the beginning of June. The nest is a cup placed at about above the ground in a clump of dense undergrowth, often close to a stream or marsh in the edge of a shola. The male as well as the female build the nest. The inside of the cup nest is lined with hair and fine material and nearly 50% of the nest weight is made up of mosses. The eggs are laid within a few days of completing the nest construction, which can take from 5 to 18 days (average of 13 days). Nests built later in the season tend to be constructed more rapidly. The clutch consists of 2 greenish blue eggs with brown blotches and streaks. The adults tear up and destroy the nest after the young birds fledge or if the nest is predated. The eggs are about long and wide. Incubation begins after the second egg is laid and both parents take turns until the chick hatches on the 16th or 17th day. If one of the eggs fails to hatch, the egg is left alone and not removed as in some bird species. The young are fed with insects during their early stages and berries such as ''Rubus'' at a later stage. The faecal sacs produced by the young are swallowed by the parents. The young fledge after 15–18 days but continue to remain nearby for about three weeks. Predators of the eggs and young include the Indian jungle crow
The Indian jungle crow (''Corvus culminatus'') is a species of crow found across the Indian Subcontinent south of the Himalayas. It is very common and readily distinguished from the house crow (''Corvus splendens''), which has a grey neck. In the ...
and the greater coucal
The greater coucal or crow pheasant (''Centropus sinensis''), is a large non-parasitic member of the cuckoo order of birds, the Cuculiformes. A widespread resident in the Indian Subcontinent and Southeast Asia, it is divided into several subspeci ...
.
The distribution of the species is restricted to a small area which is prone to habitat destruction leading to its status being considered as endangered.[
]
References
External links
{{Taxonbar, from=Q905817
Nilgiri laughingthrush
Birds of South India
Nilgiri laughingthrush
Nilgiri laughingthrush