#leiothrichidae

White-cheeked Laughingthrush (Pterorhinus vassali), family Leiothrichidae, order Passeriformes, Dalat, Vietnam

January Endangered birds 4 (#63) - the Bugun Liocichla (CR)

Somehow, this bird was undiscovered until 1995! It took several surveys before it was seen again ten years later and described. As far as we know, they are restricted to a teeny tiny area at the East end of the Himalayas.

White-browed Laughingthrush

this is the brown babbler, whose extensive range stretches across central Africa from the western coast to far western Ethiopia. it more than makes up for its fairly plain plumage with its vivid yellow-orange eyes. within its vast range, it's a fairly common sight, being very generalistic alongside its sociality. it's capable of staking out a living in a majority of the environments within its range, from dense forest to open grassland.

almost always in the company of a flock of same-species birds, who forage on the ground for insects and fruit. those sturdy legs of theirs do imply a strongly terrestrial lifestyle, though they do retreat to higher perches to preen and rest. what those legs are not used for is moving grounded debris; instead, they employ their beaks, using a wiping motion to stir leaf litter and other bug hiding places. nests are cups woven of palm fronds and dry grasses, sometimes yoinked from humans' thatched roofs. they also take advantage of human-built wells and troughs for drinking water and bathing.

as might be assumed by its extensive range, these critters are divided into subspecies - three, to be exact. the type and platycirca vary in the tones of their facial feathers. while there is no illustration of subspecies cinerea, based on the reported locations of the photographs i've looked at, i heavily suspect that this subspecies includes those with entirely yellow irises as opposed to the bicolored yellow-orange-eyed birds. as far as i can parse, there's no specific advantage to having yellow eyes. so my guess is that there was a small population of birds with yellow eyes among the overall population, and a group of those birds migrated away from the larger habitat. the yellow-eyed birds then reproduced, and thus created subspecies cinerea - a population made up almost entirely of yellow-eyed birds. but what do i know. your guess is as good as mine

19 July 2026

White-throated Laughingthrush (Pterorhinus albogularis)