Common Babbler

Latin Name: 
Turdoides caudata
Category: 
Size: 
23cm
Description: 

Sexes alike. Dull brown above, profusely streaked; brown wings; olivish-brown tail long and graduated, crossrayed darker; dull white throat; pale fulvous underbody, streaked on breast sides. Pairs or small bands in open scrub; skulker, working its way low in bush or on ground; moves with peculiar bouncing hop on the ground, the long, loose-looking tail cocked up; extremely wary, vanishing into scrub at slightest alarm; weak flight, evident when flock moves from one scrub patch to another, in ones and twos.

Habitat: 
thorn scrub, open cultivation, grass.
Food: 
insects, flower nectar, berries
Distribution: 
most of N, NW, W and peninsular India, south of outer Himalaya to about 2,000m; east to about West Bengal
Call: 
Call Description: 
noisy; pleasant, warbling whistles, several birds often in chorus; squeaky alarm notes; calls on ground and in low flight.
National Status: