New species of bird discovered in India

September 2006. Sixty years after the last new species of bird was discovered in India, A professional astronomer has made a sensational discovery. Ramana Athreya has discovered a new bird species living in the remote north-eastern India. Bugun Liocichla, a babbler, is very strikingly coloured. It is various shades of olive, with a black cap, bright yellow patch in front of eye, golden-yellow, crimson, black and white patches on the wing, and red-tipped tail feathers which are flame-coloured on the underside.

2 Bugun Liocichlas were caught and released but no scientific specimen was collected as it is thought the bird is too rare for even one to be killed. ‘With today’s modern technology, we could gather all the information we needed to confirm it as a new species. We took feathers and photographs, and recorded the bird’s song,’ said Ramana Athreya.

Amazingly Ramana first saw the species over 10 years ago at Eaglenest Wildlife Sanctuary, but he has had to wait until now to se the bird again, whilst carrying out the Eaglenest Biodiversity Project. ‘Even then I knew it was something very special,’ he said. ‘The only bird that looks remotely like it is the Emei Shan Liocichla, which is known from only a few mountains in central China, more than 1,000 km from Eaglenest.’ Detailed examination of the Indian birds and a comparison with specimens and tape recordings of Emei Shan Liocichlas showed many differences.

 

Ramana returned twice in 2005 armed with mist-nets, but did not even catch a glimpse of the birds. However he successfully trapped two birds in May 2006.

‘This is the kind of paper you dream about receiving,’ said Aasheesh Pittie, Editor of Indian Birds where the description of the Bugun Liocichla was published. ‘The discovery of a new bird is really special, but when it’s a stunning species with no geographically close relatives, and in a part of the world where bird collectors have sampled birds for more than a century, it’s nothing short of miraculous.’

Currently the known population of the Bugun Liocichla consists of only fourteen individuals including 3 breeding pairs. Amazingly the birds are not particularly shy and are very distinctive, so it is thought that it must be very rare or it would almost certainly have been found earlier. It is fortunate that the Bugun Liocichla lives in a wildlife sanctuary where it is already protected.

Courtesy of Birdlife International.