Mourning babbler | |
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Scientific classification | |
Domain: | Eukaryota |
Kingdom: | Animalia |
Phylum: | Chordata |
Class: | Aves |
Order: | Passeriformes |
Family: | Pellorneidae |
Genus: | Pellorneum |
Species: | P. malaccense |
Binomial name | |
Pellorneum malaccense (Hartlaub, 1844) | |
The mourning babbler (Pellorneum malaccense), previously the short-tailed babbler, is a species of bird in the ground babbler family Pellorneidae. It is found in the Malay Peninsula, Anambas Islands, Sumatra, Banyak Islands, Batu Islands, Riau Islands, Lingga Islands and the Natuna Islands. It was formerly considered to be conspecific with the glissando babbler (Pellorneum saturatum) and the leaflitter babbler (Pellorneum poliogene).
Its natural habitat is tropical moist lowland forests. The species is generally solitary, not joining larger mixed-species flocks, instead foraging as singles or pairs. They forage in the understory on the ground on a variety of insects including beetles, grasshoppers, and ants. Like other babblers they will use their foot to grasp food items, an unusual behaviour for passerine birds.
The mourning babbler is locally common at a number of places within its range but is considered near-threatened due to the loss of lowland forest in its range.
The mourning babbler was formally described in 1844 by the German ornithologist Gustav Hartlaub. He placed it with the shortwings in the genus Brachypteryx and coined the binomial name Brachypteryx malaccesis. He specified the type locality as Malacca in Malaysia. [2] [3] The species is placed in the genus Pellorneum that was introduced in 1832 by the English naturalist William Swainson. The glissando babbler (Pellorneum saturatum) and the leaflitter babbler (Pellorneum poliogene) were formerly considered to be subspecies but are now treated as separate species based on their significant vocal and genetic differences. [4] [5] The mourning babbler is considered to be monotypic: no subspecies are recognised. [5]
The puff-throated babbler or spotted babbler is a species of passerine bird found in Asia. They are found in scrub and moist forest mainly in hilly regions. They forage in small groups on the forest floor, turning around leaf litter to find their prey and usually staying low in the undergrowth where they can be hard to spot. However, they have loud and distinct calls, including a morning song, contact and alarm calls. It is the type species of the genus Pellorneum which may, however, currently include multiple lineages.
The yellow-billed babbler is a member of the family Leiothrichidae endemic to southern India and Sri Lanka. The yellow-billed babbler is a common resident breeding bird in Sri Lanka and southern India. Its habitat is scrub, cultivation and garden land. This species, like most babblers, is not migratory, and has short rounded wings and a weak flight and is usually seen calling and foraging in groups. It is often mistaken for the jungle babbler, whose range overlaps in parts of southern India, although it has a distinctive call and tends to be found in more vegetated habitats. Its name is also confused with Turdoides leucocephala, which is also known as white-headed babbler.
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Abbott's babbler is a species of bird in the family Pellorneidae. It is widely distributed along the Himalayas in South Asia and extending into the forests of Southeast Asia. They are short-tailed and stout birds which forage in pairs in dense undergrowth close to the ground and their presence is indicated by their distinctive calls.
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Pellorneum is a genus of passerine birds in the family Pellorneidae. Some of its species were formerly placed in the genus Trichastoma.
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The leaflitter babbler is a species of bird in the ground babbler family Pellorneidae that is found in northern and central Borneo. It was formerly considered to be a subspecies of the short-tailed babbler, now renamed the mourning babbler.
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