Superb starlings are common and found in E Africa, including Ethiopia, Somalia, Uganda, Kenya, and Tanzania. (Vinayak Yardi)

Brown sicklebills are distributed in the mountain forests of Papua New Guinea and were discovered by Carl Hunstein in 1884. (Markus Lilje / www.rockjumperbirding.com)

Spot-billed ducks are resident in the southern part of their range from Pakistan and India to S Japan. (Shishir Saksena)

Velvet-fronted nuthatches are found in S Asia from Pakistan, India and Sri Lanka E to S China and Indonesia, preferring all types of woodlands with open evergreen forest as the optimal habitat. (Girish Ketkar)

White-throated fantails are found in forest, scrub and cultivation across tropical S Asia from the Himalayas, India and Bangladesh E to Indonesia. Photographed here in Sattal Uttarakhand (India). (Anantha Murthy)

White-cheeked barbets range along the Western Ghats S from the Surat Dangs and along the associated hills of S India into parts of the SE Ghats mainly in the Shevaroy and Chitteri hills. (Nitin Lokur)

White-collared mannikins are resident breeders in the tropical New World from SE Mexico to Costa Rica and the extreme west of Panama. (Alvaro Cubero Vega)

Narrow-billed tody are found in the Dominican Republic and Haiti, preferring subtropical or tropical moist montane forests and heavily-degraded former forest. (Matthew Matthiessen / www.rockjumperbirding.com)

Osprey are the second most widely distributed raptor species on earth, after the Peregrine Falcon. They have a worldwide distribution and are found in temperate and tropical regions of all continents except Antarctica. (Peter Chromik)

Kalij pheasants are found in forests and thickets in the Himalayan foothills from Nepal to W Thailand. (Gururaj Moorching)

Ruby-throated hummingbirds breed throughout most of eastern N America and the Canadian prairies, preferring deciduous and pine forests, as well as forest edges, orchards and gardens. (Melissa Penta)

Purple swamphens have subspecies in the Mediterranean, Africa, tropical Asia, Australasia, Indonesia and the Philippines. (Richard & Eileen Flack)

Sparkling violetears are widespread in the highlands of N and W South America, including the Andes (N of Argentina), the Venezuelan Coastal Range, and the Tepuis. (Owen Deutsch)

Blue-grey tanagers range from Mexico S to NE Bolivia and N Brazil, as well as all of the Amazon Basin. (Owen Deutsch)

White-breasted waterhens are widely distributed across SE Asia and the Indian Subcontinent, inhabiting marshes across south Asia from Pakistan, India and Sri Lanka to south China and Indonesia. (Jineesh Mallishery)

Horned grebes have a wide distribution across the N hemisphere and also known as the Devil-diver, Hell-diver, Pink-eyed diver and Water witch. (Lennart Hessel)

Himalayan cutias the Himalayan region, from India to N Thailand, preferring tropical to subtropical humid montane forests. (Markus Lilje / www.rockjumperbirding.com)

Blue waxbills are found in Angola, Botswana, Burundi, the Republic of Congo, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, São Tomé and Príncipe, South Africa, Swaziland, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe. (Anja Denker)

Blue-breasted bee-eaters are found in Angola, Burundi, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Republic of the Congo, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Gabon, Kenya, Nigeria, Rwanda, Sudan, Tanzania, Uganda, and Zambia. (Markus Lilje / www.rockjumperbirding.com)

Sooty thrushes are endemic to the highlands of Costa Rica and W Panama. (Alvaro Cubero Vega)

Greater coucals or Crow pheasants are a large non-parasitic member of the cuckoo order of birds and are widespread residents in Asia, from India, E to S China and Indonesia. (Bindia Gupta)

White-throated magpie-jays range from the Pacific-slope thornforest of Jalisco (Mexico) to Guanacaste (Costa Rica) and are highly-gregarious, mobbing observers and making nuisance of themselves. (Frank Thierfelder)

Double-crested cormorants occur along inland waterways and some coastal areas, and are widely-distributed across N America from the Aleutian Islands in Alaska to Florida and Mexico. (Peter Chromik)

Crimson-backed tanagers are found in Colombia, French Guyana, Panama and Venezuela, preferring subtropical or tropical moist lowland forests and heavily-degraded former forests. Photographed here in Panama. (Owen Deutsch)