Asian Paradise Flycatcher

The Asian Paradise Flycatcher, also known as the Common Paradise Flycatcher, is a medium-sized passerine bird. It was before classified with the Old World flycatcher family Muscicapidae, but the paradise flycatchers, monarch flycatchers and Australasian fantails are now usually grouped with the drongos in the family Dicruridae, which has most of its members in Australasia and steamy southern Asia.

The Asian Paradise Flycatcher breeds from Turkistan to Manchuria. It is migratory, wintering in steamy Asia. There are occupant populations further south, for example in southern India and Sri Lanka, so both visiting migrants and the locally breeding subspecies occur in these areas in winter.

This species is usually found in thick forests and other well-wooded habitats. Three or four eggs are laid in a cup nest in a tree.

The adult male Asian Paradise Flycatcher is about 20 cm long, but the long tail bunting double this. It has a black crested head, chestnut upperparts and pale grey underpants.

By their second year, the males of the migratory Indian race T. p. paradise begin to obtain white feathers. By the third year, the male plumage is completely white, other than the black head. Males of the sedentary Sri Lankan race T. p. Ceylonese’s are always chestnut.

The female of all races resembles the old joke male, but has a grey throat, smaller crest and lacks the tail streamers.