A trek they had undertaken braving the rains in March to Mugaphi peak in Northeastern Arunachal Pradesh in search of grey-bellied wren babbler, a rare songbird, was tough and tiring. But what they found and recorded there: a wren babbler with whitish belly is possibly a new species of the elusive songbird.
Six birdwatchers from Bengaluru, Chennai and Thiruvananthapuram, along with their two guides from Arunachal Pradesh said they have stumbled on a new species of Wren Babbler.
“All the birds we found sing sweet song that was similar to the songs of the Naga Wren Babbler; and quite unlike the trilling song of the Grey-bellied Wren Babbler,” said Praveen J, one of the members from Kerala.
“As the name indicates, the ground colour of the belly of Grey-bellied Wren Babbler is grey. However, all the photos we got showed birds with whitish belly. Surprisingly, the single Smithsonian specimen from these mountains also had a whitish belly.” said Dipu Karuthedathu, another member of the expedition, hailing from Bengaluru.
Their findings were published by Indian BIRDS, a peer-reviewed journal of south Asian ornithology, recently. Subramanian Sankar (Chennai), Hemraj Duraiswami (Bengaluru), Yolisa Yobin and Rahul Baruah (Arunachal Pradesh) are four other members of the expedition team.
A statement by the team said grey-bellied wren babbler is mostly found in Myanmar with some birds occurring in adjoining China and Thailand. There has been only one previous report of grey-bellied wren babbler from India when two specimens were collected from these same mountains back in 1988. One of the specimens is now in the Smithsonian Museum in the United States. It was identified as a grey-bellied wren babbler by the ornithologist Pamela Rasmussen when she included this species in her book published in 2005, they said.
Braving the continuous rains, the team managed to take some pictures, videos and recorded its songs. They came back and analysed the skins of other Wren Babblers in many museums as well as photographs from other sites. They tried to match their sounds with existing recordings of grey-bellied wren babbler. They also got photographs of the single specimen from the Smithsonian Museum.
The plumage in conjunction with the songs does not match with any known species. Establishing and naming a species or subspecies scientifically requires genetic material from these birds to be compared against other wren babbler species. However, the team has already given an English name for the bird after the Lisu community, inhabiting the area.
“We believe that the Lisu Wren Babbler may be present in more sites in this mountain range...” said Yolisa Yobin, who has been organising birding expeditions in Namdapha for the past five years.