IDENTITY:

Eye -ring and bill can be bright blue. Male has grey to blackish head and breast, white breast-band, pinkish-red underparts, black and greyvermiculated wing-coverts.

HABIT AND HABITAT:

These birds usually perch still, especially when alarmed and will sometimes clinging laterally to branches. When calling they sometimes raise and lower their tail. The call is a series of guttural or purring notes. The song of the male is a series of percussive kyau calls.

FOOD:

Malabar trogons feed exclusively on insects and fruits have not been noted in their diet unlike in the New World trogons. Seeds have however been reported in the diet of Sri Lankan specimens. In the forests of Sri Lanka, they are often found in mixed-species foraging flocks where they may sometimes be subject to kleptoparasitism by drongos.

VOICE:

A throaty cue-cue-cue.

INFO:

The Malabar trogon (Harpactes fasciatus) is a species of bird in the trogon family. It is found in the forests of Sri Lanka and peninsular India. In India it is mainly found in the Western Ghats, hill forests of central India and in parts of the Eastern Ghats. They are insectivorous and although not migratory, may move seasonally in response to rain in hill forest regions. Like in other trogons, males and females vary in plumage.