The white-shouldered triller (''Lalage sueurii'') is a passerine bird belonging to the triller genus ''Lalage'' in the

cuckoo-shrike The cuckooshrikes and allies in the family Campephagidae are small to medium-sized passerine bird species found in the subtropical and tropical Africa, Asia and Australasia. The 93 species are divided into 11 genera. The woodshrikes (''Tephrodorn ...

family Campephagidae. It is found in Indonesia and East Timor. The

white-winged triller The white-winged triller (''Lalage tricolor'') is one of the smaller members of the cuckooshrike family, Campephagidae. It is found throughout mainland Australia and possibly on the islands to the north, including New Guinea and eastern Indonesi ...

(''L. tricolor'') of

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

and New Guinea was formerly included in this species but is now treated as a separate species. It is a fairly small bird, 17 centimetres in length. The

bill Bill(s) may refer to: Common meanings * Banknote, paper cash (especially in the United States) * Bill (law), a proposed law put before a legislature * Invoice, commercial document issued by a seller to a buyer * Bill, a bird or animal's beak Plac ...

is grey with a black tip and the legs and feet are black. The male is mainly black above and white below. It has a grey rump, white stripe over the eye, white wing-patches and white on the outer tail-feathers. Females have a similar pattern to the males but are brown instead of black above and have fine black barring on the underparts. The pied triller is similar but is slightly smaller with a broader stripe above the eye and more white in the wing. The male white-winged triller has no white stripe over the eye. The song of the white-shouldered triller is a metallic whistling which is sometimes given in flight. It also utters a rapid series of harsh notes. It occurs in eastern Java, southern

Sulawesi Sulawesi (), also known as Celebes (), is an island in Indonesia. One of the four Greater Sunda Islands, and the world's eleventh-largest island, it is situated east of Borneo, west of the Maluku Islands, and south of Mindanao and the Sulu Ar ...

Bali Bali () is a province of Indonesia and the westernmost of the Lesser Sunda Islands. East of Java and west of Lombok, the province includes the island of Bali and a few smaller neighbouring islands, notably Nusa Penida, Nusa Lembongan, and Nu ...

and on the

Lesser Sunda Islands The Lesser Sunda Islands or nowadays known as Nusa Tenggara Islands ( id, Kepulauan Nusa Tenggara, formerly ) are an archipelago in Maritime Southeast Asia, north of Australia. Together with the Greater Sunda Islands to the west they make up t ...

. It inhabits open woodland, savannas and agricultural land in dry, lowland areas. It feeds on insects, often swooping down from a perch to catch them on the ground.

References

*MacKinnon, John & Phillipps, Karen (1993) ''A Field Guide to the Birds of Borneo, Sumatra, Java and Bali'', Oxford University Press, Oxford. *Strange, Morten (2001) ''A Photographic Guide to the Birds of Indonesia'', Christopher Helm, London.

External links

Oriental Bird Images: White-shouldered Triller
{{Taxonbar, from=Q841358

white-shouldered triller The white-shouldered triller (''Lalage sueurii'') is a passerine bird belonging to the Lalage (bird), triller genus ''Lalage'' in the cuckoo-shrike family Campephagidae. It is found in Indonesia and East Timor. The white-winged triller (''L. tric ...

Birds of Sulawesi Birds of the Lesser Sunda Islands

Taxa named by Louis Jean Pierre Vieillot