New bird species found in India after more than 50 years
New Delhi: A striking multi-coloured bird has been discovered in India's remote northeast, making it the first ornithological find in the country in more than half a century, experts said on Tuesday.The Bugun Liocichla, scientifically known as Liocichla bugunorum, a kind of babbler, was discovered in May at the Eaglenest Wildlife Sanctuary in the hilly state of Arunachal Pradesh.
The bird with olive and golden-yellow plum-age, a black cap and flame-tipped wings is 20 cm in length and named after the Bugun tribespeople who live on the sanctuary's periphery.
Professional astronomer and keen birdwatcher, Ramana Athreya, who discovered the bird said that although two Bugun Liocichlas were caught and examined at the sanctuary, both were released and no scientific specimen collected.
"We thought the bird was just too rare for one to be killed [for scientific study]," said Athreya. He wrote a paper which was circulated among foreign and Indian experts including Pamela C. Rasmussen, assistant curator of mammalogy and ornithology at Michigan State university, and author of The Ripley Guide of Birds of South Asia.
The experts verified the Bugun Liocichlas as a new species and the International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature then approved the name.
The last new bird species to be discovered in mainland India was the Rusty-throated "Mishmi" Wren-babbler Spelaeornis badeigularis in Arunachal Pradesh in 1948. The known population of the Bugun Liocichla consists of only 14, including three breeding pairs.
Athreya said he had first briefly spotted the bird in 1995. "But it was only this year after I had a sufficiently good look that we could move into the matter."
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