The Sri Lanka scimitar babbler or Ceylon scimitar babbler (''Pomatorhinus melanurus'') is an Old World babbler. It is endemic to the island of

Sri Lanka Sri Lanka (, ; si, ශ්‍රී ලංකා, Śrī Laṅkā, translit-std=ISO (); ta, இலங்கை, Ilaṅkai, translit-std=ISO ()), formerly known as Ceylon and officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, is an ...

, and was formerly treated as a subspecies of

Indian scimitar babbler The Indian scimitar babbler (''Pomatorhinus horsfieldii'') is an Old World babbler. It is found in peninsular India in a range of forest habitats. They are most often detected by their distinctive calls which include an antiphonal duet by a pair ...

. The nominate form is found in the western part of wet hill regions of Sri Lanka, while race ''holdsworthi'' is found in the dry lowlands and eastern hills.

In culture

Most scimitar babbler species are referred as ''parandel kurulla'' by the Sinhala speaking community. The term 'parandel' refers to dried grass and probably refers to the color of the bird. The

vernacular A vernacular or vernacular language is in contrast with a "standard language". It refers to the language or dialect that is spoken by people that are inhabiting a particular country or region. The vernacular is typically the native language, n ...

name of the bird ''parandel kurulla'' roughly translates to English as 'dried-grass colored bird'. This bird appears in a 4.50

rupee Rupee is the common name for the currencies of India, Mauritius, Nepal, Pakistan, Seychelles, and Sri Lanka, and of former currencies of Afghanistan, Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, the United Arab Emirates (as the Gulf rupee), British East Africa, B ...

n postal stamp.

References

External links

Internet Bird Collection
{{Taxonbar, from=Q1308974 Sri Lanka scimitar babbler Endemic birds of Sri Lanka Sri Lanka scimitar babbler Sri Lanka scimitar babbler