Snapshot sightings 28A

Snapshot sightings

‘White-headed’ Black Bulbul from Aizawal, Mizoram K. Lalmuansanga

From 18–30 January 2016, three ‘white-headed’ Black Bulbuls Hypsipetes leucocephalus were photographed by several birders at Aizawal Zoological Gardens (23.79ºN, 92.67ºE), Aizawal, Mizoram. The race of the 34 could not be definitely stated, but they may belong either to leucothorax, or stresemanni as they 32 Black from Solapur, Maharashtra were entirely blackish-grey, with pure white heads. This plumage has Rahul Vanjari & Raghvendra Vanjari been reported once from Namdapha National Park, which birds were tentatively assigned to stresemanni (Srinivasan et al. 2009). During one of our frequent visits to 35 Mission Vengthlang, Aizawl, Mizoram E-mail: [email protected] the wetlands in Solapur District, Rusty-rumped Warbler from Pallikaranai, Tamil Nadu Maharashtra, we had an opportunistic Aravind Amirtharaj U. sighting of a Black Bittern While birding in the flavicollis on 31 Pallikaranai marshlands March 2016 at (12.93ºN, 80.22ºE) of Degaon (17.67ºN, Kancheepuram District, 75.87ºE), Tamil Nadu, I photographed Mangawedha road. a single Locustella warbler Prasad (2006) lists that was later identified as just two records, a Rusty-rumped Warbler one from Mumbai, Locustella certhiola based and another from on white tips to retrices, Pune, from western Maharashtra. There are no records in the 33 and prominent white wide Deccan tract between Mumbai, Goa, Hyderabad and supercelium. This is an unusual record for southern , after Amaravati areas (eBird 2016) and this could be the first record of that of George & Issac (1965), and a first record for Tamil Nadu. this species for central Maharasthra.

N.NO.2/O.NO. 9/1, VOC Street, Jaganatha Nagar First Main Road, Arumbakkam, Chennai- Rahul Vanjari, Nature Conservation Circle, Solapur Raghvendra Vanjari 2 D B F Dayanand 600106. E-mail: [email protected] College of Arts & Science, Solapur. E-mail: [email protected]

References White-tailed Tropicbird from Ross Island, eBird. 2016. eBird: An online database of distribution and abundance [web South Andaman application]. eBird, Ithaca, New York. Available: http://www.ebird.org. (Accessed Deepansh Mishra on 20 July 2016). George, P. V., & Mathew, I. P., 1965. The Pallas’s Grasshopper Warbler, Locustella certhiola rubescens Blyth from South India. Journal of the Bombay Natural A single White-tailed Tropicbird Phaethon lepturus was seen History Society 62 (2): 304. from Ross Island (11.68ºN, 92.76ºE) on 03 March 2016 and Hume, A. O., 1874. Contributions to the ornithology of India. The Islands of the Bay of photographed from the Port Blair jetty (11.67ºN, 92.74ºE) on Bengal. Stray Feathers 2 (1,2&3): 29–324. the next day. Though listed as a rarity for India (Praveen et al. Prasad, A., 2006. Birds of western Maharashtra. A reference guide. 1st ed. Mapusa, 2013), a specimen was taken at exactly the same locality in Goa: Other India Press. Pp. 1–315. the nineteenth century (Hume 1874), and this appears to be Praveen J., Jayapal, R., & Pittie, A., 2013. Notes on Indian rarities—1: Seabirds. Indian a record from the Andaman Islands after 140 years. Based on BIRDS 8 (5): 113–125. the golden-tinged tail, this could belong to subspecies fulvus that Rasmussen, P. C., & Anderton, J. C., 2012. Birds of South : the Ripley guide. 2nd ed. Washington, D.C. and Barcelona: Smithsonian Institution and Lynx Edicions. 2 breeds on Christmas Island. vols. Pp. 1–378; 1–683. Srinivasan, U., Dalvi, S., & Yobin, K., 2009. First records of ‘white-headed’ Black Bulbul A/08, Sneh Nagar extension, Sneh Nagar Jabalpur (M.P) (482002) Hypsipetes leucocephalus from India. Indian Birds 5 (1): 28–30. Email: [email protected]