Birdfinding.info ⇒ Remains locally common in several parts of its natural range despite widespread trapping for cagebird trade. It can be seen at several feeding stations in the Himalayan foothills, including those at Sattal (Uttarakhand), Chakki Mod (Himachal Pradesh), Lava (West Bengal), and Gangtok (Sikkim). In China, it can be found at Emei Shan (Sichuan), Kunmig (Yunnan), and near Shanghai at Hangzhou Botanical Garden. In Hawaii, it can be seen in the hills above Honolulu (Aiea Ridge, Tantalus Drive, Lyon Arboretum, and Kuli’ou’ou Valley), on Maui at Polipoli Spring, and at many sites on the Big Island, including Pololu, Kaloko Mauka, Manuka state Park, Pu’u La’au, Saddle Road kipukas, Hakalau Forest National Wildlife Refuge, and Hawaii Volcanoes National Park.
Red-billed Leiothrix
Leiothrix lutea
Subtropical forests from the Himalayan foothills to eastern China; introduced elsewhere.
In the Himalayan foothills, local at middle elevations from northern Pakistan to northern Myanmar, then continuing east across Yunnan. Also south in the Khasi Hills of Meghalaya and mountains of Nagaland and northwestern Myanmar. Widely but locally distributed eastward across China, north to Shaanxi, Henan, Anhui, and Jiangsu, and south into northern Vietnam.
Introduced populations are established in Japan on Kyushu, Shikoku, and southern and central Honshu, and Hawaii: on Oahu, Molokai, Maui, and the Big Island—formerly also on Kauai.
Several introduced populations appear to be growing in western Europe. The largest are in the northwestern foothills of the Pyrenees in northern Spain and southwestern France, and in the hills of southeastern France and northwestern Italy (approximately from Nice to Florence, and possibly expanding to the foothills of the Alps between Milan and Venice). Additional populations have emerged: in central Portugal (Coimbra to Setúbal); around Barcelona; and in parks north of Paris.
Identification
A small, plump babbler, usually gray overall with an olive cap, yellow to whitish or pale-gray mask and cheek, blackish whisker, and glowing yellow-orange throat, chest, and undertail coverts.
Details of coloration vary widely. Some plumages are extensively infused with yellow and orange, including most of the head and breast. At the bright end of the spectrum, can be almost entirely yellow and orange below and bright-olive above.
The wings are largely black but with bright-yellow outer webs on the primaries and a mix of yellow and red on parts of the secondaries.
The bill is either coral-red or bicolored with a black base and coral-red tip.
The tail is blackish and toward the tip it is notched and flared.
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Jhandi, Kalimpong, West Bengal, India; June 2, 2017.) © Prasun Kumar Chakraborty
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Corbett Tiger Reserve, Uttarakhand, India; January 2009.) © Nikhil Devasar
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Okhrey, Sikkim, India; March 22, 2016.) © Sumit Sengupta
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Lava, Darjeeling, West Bengal, India; December 2, 2017.) © Supratim Mukherjee
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Darjeeling, West Bengal, India; April 25, 2015.) © Abhirup Dutta Gupta
Red-billed Leiothrix, generally suffused with yellow. (Darjeeling, West Bengal, India; January 24, 2016.) © Sumit Sengupta
Red-billed Leiothrix, dorsal view showing tail notch and flare. (Okhrey, Sikkim, India; March 22, 2016.) © Sumit Sengupta
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Sattal, Nainital, Uttarakhand, India; December 23, 2018.) © Yash Kothiala
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Sattal, Nainiral, Uttarakhand, India; April 18, 2017.) © Jaysukh Parekh-Suman
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Emei Shan, Sichuan, China; June 9, 2013.) © Dubi Shapiro
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Sattal, Nainital, Uttarakhand, India; May 25, 2009.) © Nitin Srinivasamurthy
Red-billed Leiothrix, more olive, less gray than most. (Darjeeling, West Bengal, India; January 26, 2016.) © Sumit Sengupta
Red-billed Leiothrix, showing extensive red in the wings—also note tail notch and flare. (Sattal, Nainital, Uttarakhand, India; May 3, 2010.) © Parag Damle
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Corbett Tiger Reserve, Uttarakhand, India; January 1, 2011.) © Joydeep Sarkar
Red-billed Leiothrix, showing tail notch and flare. (Manoa Falls, Honolulu, Hawaii; February 25, 2013.) © Greg Griffith
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Hu Ping Shan, Hunan, China; July 2, 2012.) © Jonathan Martinez
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Margalla Hills, Islamabad, Pakistan; January 28, 2018.) © Mudassar Afaque Ahmed
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Baihualing, Gaoligong Shan, Yunnan, China; January 12, 2019.) © Ayuwat Jearwattanakanok
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Chaffi, Nainital, Uttarakhand, India; May 10, 2017.) © Ankur Moitra
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Sattal, Nainital, Uttarakhand, India; April 6, 2018.) © Sarwandeep Singh
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Aiea Ridge, Oahu, Hawaii; August 15, 2018.) © Mary Catherine Miguez
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Sattal, Nainital, Uttarakhand, India; February 27, 2016.) © Sarwandeep Singh
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Sattal, Nainiral, Uttarakhand, India; April 6, 2019.) © Sharma BC
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Sattal, Nainital, Uttarakhand, India; November 24, 2012.) © Nitin Srinivasamurthy
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Aiea Ridge Trail, Oahu, Hawaii; March 17, 2018.) © Sharif Uddin
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Okhrey, Sikkim, India; June 3, 2016.) © Santanu Manna
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Baihualing, Gaoligong Shan, Yunnan, China; January 12, 2019.) © Ayuwat Jearwattanakanok
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Tsukinowa Imperial Graveyard, Kyoto, Japan; February 19, 2020.) © Paul Hyde
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Wailupe Valley, Oahu, Hawaii; December 28, 2019.) © Keith Dickey
Red-billed Leiothrix, singing. (Kuankuoshui Nature Reserve, Guizhou, China; May 25, 2019.) © James Kennerley
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Margalla Hills, Islamabad, Pakistan; April 1, 2019.) © Tahir Abbas
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Sattal, Nainital, Uttarakhand, India; May 5, 2017.) © Sarwandeep Singh
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Kotdwar, Pauri Garhwal, Uttarakhand, India; February 2, 2018.) © Sarwandeep Singh
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Kotdwar, Pauri Garhwal, Uttarakhand, India; February 2, 2018.) © Sarwandeep Singh
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Lava, Darjeeling, West Bengal, India; January 26, 2015.) © Debarshi Chakrabarti
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Mall Road, Darjeeling, West Bengal, India; May 30, 2016.) © Santanu Chatterjee
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Sattal, Nainital, Uttarakhand, India; April 2, 2016.) © Pranjal J. Saikia
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Jamargadi, Kotdwara, Uttarakhand, India; February 28, 2016.) © Prashant Pansari
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Baihualing, Gaoligong Shan, Yunnan, China; January 12, 2019.) © Ayuwat Jearwattanakanok
Red-billed Leiothrix, flock at feeding stations. (Sattal, Nainital, Uttarakhand, India; February 3, 2019.) © Sapon Baruah
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Gangtok, Sikkim, India; March 25, 2013.) © Arjit Banerjee
Red-billed Leiothrix, with almost entirely yellow underparts. (Sattal, Nainiral, Uttarakhand, India; April 18, 2017.) © Jaysukh Parekh-Suman
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Sattal, Nainital, Uttarakhand, India; April 16, 2019.) © Savithri Singh
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Sattal, Nainital, Uttarakhand, India; April 14, 2019.) © Savithri Singh
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Sattal, Nainital, Uttarakhand, India; May 12, 2017.) © Bhavesh Rathod
Red-billed Leiothrix, appearing almost entirely yellow. (Fukuoka, Kyushu, Japan; January 31, 2016.) © Da Chih Chen
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Sattal, Nainital, Uttarakhand, India; May 18, 2014.) © Soumyajit Nandy
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Sattal, Nainital, Uttarakhand, India; March 1, 2018.) © Nikhil Devasar
Red-billed Leiothrix. (Baihualing, Yunnan, China; December 25, 2017.) © Mohit Kumar Ghatak
Red-billed Leiothrix, immature. (Lyon Arboretum, Honolulu, Hawaii; October 18, 2019.) © Scott Berglund
Red-billed Leiothrix, immature. (Lyon Arboretum, Honolulu, Hawaii; October 18, 2019.) © Scott Berglund
Red-billed Leiothrix, immature. (Chakki Morh, Solan, Himachal Pradesh, India; September 28, 2016.) © Sriram Reddy
Red-billed Leiothrix, immature. (Chengdu, Sichuan, China; October 20, 2018.) © Michel Adrot
Voice. One song type is described as “a rich, mellow, rather rapidly warbled phrase.” (Brazil 2009) Another is “a series of 4-7 plaintive whistles on a level pitch.” (Pratt et al. 1987)
Notes
Polytypic species consisting of six recognized subspecies.
References
BirdLife International. 2017. Leiothrix lutea (amended version of 2016 assessment). The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species 2017: e.T22716522A111107050. https://dx.doi.org/10.2305/IUCN.UK.2017-1.RLTS.T22716522A111107050.en. (Accessed October 23, 2020.)
Brazil, M. 2009. Birds of East Asia. Princeton University Press.
eBird. 2020. eBird: An online database of bird distribution and abundance. Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Ithaca, N.Y. http://www.ebird.org. (Accessed October 23, 2020.)
Raine, H., and A.F. Raine. 2020. ABA Field Guide to the Birds of Hawai’i. Scott & Nix, Inc., New York.
Pratt, H.D., P.L. Bruner, and D.G. Berrett. 1987. A Field Guide to the Birds of Hawaii and the Tropical Pacific. Princeton University Press.
Pyle, R.L., and P. Pyle. 2017. The Birds of the Hawaiian Islands: Occurrence, History, Distribution, and Status. Version 2 (January 1, 2017). http://hbs.bishopmuseum.org/birds/rlp-monograph/. B.P. Bishop Museum, Honolulu, Hawaii.
Xeno-Canto. 2020. Red-billed Leiothrix – Leiothrix lutea. https://www.xeno-canto.org/species/Leiothrix-lutea. (Accessed October 23, 2020.)