“Flying fruit” Strawberry finches are found in open fields and grasslands in tropical Asia where they are a popular cage bird due to the male’s red plumage in the breeding season. (Gurum Ekalavya)“Calling for more forest conservation” White-throated kingfishers are tree kingfishers often found far from water across a wide distribution in Eurasia from Bulgaria, Turkey, W Asia all the way E through the Indian Subcontinent to the Philippines. (Dibyendu Ash)“East of the valley!” Von der Decken’s hornbills prefer the thorn scrub and more arid habitats of East Africa with main population E of the Great Rift Valley. Photographed here in El Karama (Nanyuki, Kenya). (Richard & Eileen Flack)“Big hair day” Striated laughingthrushes are found in the N temperate regions of the Indian Subcontinent across most of Bhutan, India, Myanmar, Tibet and Nepal. (Saminathan Babu)“Heron dance” Purple herons have a wide global distribution breeding in Africa, central and S Europe, and S and E Asia with the European populations wintering in tropical Africa. (Rinku Behera)“Forest Tinkerbell” Tickell’s blue flycatchers have a wide distributional range from India to Indonesia, but breed in tropical Asia from the Indian Subcontinent all the way E to SE Asia. (Pratibha Riswadkar)“Future fisherman” Indian fish owls are found in the warmer subtropical and humid tropical parts of continental Asia and some offshore islands. (Pradyuman Samant)“Sword fighter” Indian scimitar babblers prefer feeding in dense thickets, but are found in a varety of forested habitats in peninsular India. (Pratik Humnabadkar)“Regal, plush duck” King eiders spend most of the year in coastal marine ecosystems throughout the higher latitudes, migrating to the Arctic tundra to breed in June and July under the 24-hr sun. Photographed here in Båtsfjord (Norway). (Antero Topp)“Famous grouse” Black grouse are found across Europe from the UK through Scandinavia and Estonia to Russia with populations in E Europe Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland to Belarus, Romania and Ukraine. There is a population in the Alps, and isolated remnants in Germany, France, Belgium and the Netherlands. (Lennart Hessel)“Flying punk” Sulphur-crested cockatoos are a common resident in well-wooded habitats in Australia and New Guinea. (Lennart Hessel)“Little shore specialist” Little ringed plovers prefer gravel pits, sandy islands and river edges in Europe and W Asia during the breeding season, wintering in Africa. (Katarzyna Wojno)“Umbrella bird” Long-wattled umbrellabirds are found in a relatively narrow belt along the Pacific slopes of the Chocó of W Colombia and Ecuador. Photographed here in Ecuador. (Owen Deutsch)“Endangered adaption” Egyptian vultures are considered Endangered throughout their wide distributional range from from southwestern Europe and northern Africa to India. (Bhavesh K Munshi)“Mini-stork” Stork-billed kingfishers are sparsely distributed on the tropical Indian Subcontinent and SE Asia from India and Sri Lanka to Indonesia. (Dibyendu Ash)“Styling!” Bar-throated minlas are found in the Indian Subcontinent and SE Asia, ranging across Bhutan, India, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Nepal, Thailand, Tibet and Vietnam. (Dibyendu Ash)“Sun beauty” Crimson-backed sunbirds are endemic to the W Ghats of India. (Aditya Padhye)“Metalworker” Coppersmith barbets have a metronomic call that sounds like a coppersmith striking metal with a hammer and are found in the Indian Subcontinent and parts of SE Asia. (Suraj Kamath)“Jungle chicken” Red junglefowl are found from S India E across S China, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Indonesia. (Vipin Sharma)“South Africa’s parrot” Cape parrots playing in the early morning above an African green pigeon that is just waking up. Cape parrots are Endangered and endemic to South Africa. (Rodnick Clifton Biljon)“Forest joker” White-throated laughingthrushes prefer subtropical or tropical moist montane forests.in Afghanistan, Bhutan, India, Myanmar, Nepal, Pakistan, Tibet and Vietnam. (Amit Kumar Ghosh)“Gull’s feast” Brown-headed gulls breed each year on the high plateaus of central Asia from Tajikistan to Inner Mongolia, wintering on the coasts and large inland lakes of tropical S Asia. (Arun Varghese)“Bullish attitude” Ashy bulbuls are found across Bangladesh, Bhutan, Cambodia, India, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Burma, Nepal, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam. (Pranesh Kodancha)“Wow warbler” Blackburnian warblers breed in E North America from S Canada W to S Canadian Prairies, the Great Lakes and New England all the way to North Carolina, wintering in S America. Photographed here in Ecuador. (Nina Stavlund)“Sunset wagtail” Western yellow wagtails breed in much of temperate Europe and Asia, remaining resident in milder parts of their range such as W Europe, but migrating to Africa, the Indian subcontinent, and S Asia in the rest of their range. (Jignesh Minaxi)
