Little Grebe

I recently saw little grebes in Keoladeo NP in India. They were a long distance from me and my photos are poor. In June 2022 I saw little grebes in the Tagus Estuary of Portugal which were also a long distance from me and my photos are poor. There are seven subspecies of little grebe. Those I saw in Portugal were the nominate ssp. ruficollis, which are found from Europe to western Asia and northern Africa. The little grebes I saw in Portugal are not migratory. Those I saw in India were ssp. albescens, found in southern and central Asia, including India. The central Asian little grebes are migratory and the south Asian birds are not. 

In summer or breeding plumage, it is dark above with a rufous color neck, cheeks and flanks and a yellow gape (the area connecting the upper and lower half of the bill). In non-breeding and juvenile birds, brownish gray replaces the rufous coloring. Juvenile birds have a yellow bill with a small black tip, black and white streaks on the cheeks and sides of the neck, and the bill gradually turns to black in adulthood. 

This and the next photo were taken in India. 

Note that the three on the right are adolescents with yellow bills and brownish gray plumage. 

This and the next photo were taken in Portugal. 

Illustration of ssp. rufiollis from Birds of the World. 

Range from Birds of the World. 

Wire-Tailed Swallow

It is not often that I am with a good guide and catch a bird that the guide did not see, or at least did not identify to me. I got home and was reviewing my photos from Keoladeo NP in India and got one photo of a very distinctive bird taking flight from a bare branch. iNaturalist easily identified it as a wire-tailed swallow and this bird is phenomenal. First, my photo. 

Now look at this photo from Wikipedia. Just gorgeous. 

No question it is the same bird. What a beauty. Next are illustrations from Birds of the World. 

Male flying

Female

Male, ssp. filifera, from Birds of the World. 

There are two subspecies. I saw filifera, also known as the Asian wire-tailed swallow. It is found in southern and southeastern Asia. The nominate ssp., smithii, is also known as the African wire-tailed swallow and is found throughout Africa. They are associated with water, typically seen flying low over it. They feed on insects, especially flies, while flying.  It has bright blue upperparts, bright white underparts and a chestnut cap. It is named for its very long filamentous outermost tail feathers, which trail behind like two wires. The male has longer "wires" than the female. 

Range from Birds of the World. 

Yellow-Throated Sparrow

At Keoladeo NP in India with our guide, Ashok, I kept a list of the birds we were seeing. As I got home and was reviewing my photos I couldn't find the yellow-throated sparrow photos. I looked through my photos completely, several times, and couldn't find them. I finally got to a group of photos of the rose-ringed parakeet up in a dead tree and noticed some small birds off to one side. I focused on those small birds, cropping the photos and zooming in as much as I could. Lo and behold, there they were - yellow-throated sparrows. 

Wikipedia notes that the white double wing bar is diagnostic on the otherwise dull gray-brown sparrow. Males have a chestnut shoulder patch which can sometimes be hard to see, just above the top white wing bar. I believe this photo shows it. Thus the alternate name of chestnut-shouldered petronia. 

 

Illustration of a female from Birds of the World. 

Illustration of a male from Birds of the World. Note the small yellow section on the throat. 

Ashok noted that it is also known as the chestnut-shouldered petronia. Wikipedia states that they are often atop bare branches on trees while calling. Bingo. They have a pale yellow spot on the throat in fresh plumage. the yellow spot is much reduced or absent in females. Females do not have the chestnut shoulder patch. There are two ssp. We saw the nominate ssp. xanthocollis, found in India, northern Pakistan and north-eastern Afghanistan. 

Range from Birds of the World. 

Indian Gray Hornbill

When we first arrived at Keoladeo NP, my brothers-in-law, Stan and David, and I moved along a road toward our motorized rickshaw. Our wives left with the van to check into our hotel. From the road, our guide Ashok pointed into a large tree and said "gray hornbill." I kind of dismissed it, "Oh, I've seen them before," but I went over and took a few photos. I keep forgetting that in birding, geography is important. It turns out that the Indian gray hornbill which I was being introduced to is quite a bit different than the African gray hornbill I'd previously seen on several occasions. This has happened to me a number of times. I see a bird that looks very familiar and dismiss it as a bird I've seen before, then learn it is a new species I've not seen before with very subtle or not-so-subtle differences. Geography, even relatively short distances, such as in the Galapagos Islands, can work changes in similar birds. And Africa to India is a little more distant than the different islands are from each other in the Galapagos!

Indian gray hornbill in Keoladeo NP. 

The Indian gray hornbill is a silvery-gray and white hornbill with a long and graduated tail with a light tip. The male has a blackish bill and narrow casque, with a protruding front edge. The bill tip and much of the lower mandible are pale yellow. There is bare gray skin around the eyes and the eyes are reddish-brown. The female is smaller, the casque is less prominent, and the eyes are browner. 

Illustration of a female from Birds of the World. 

Illustration of a male from Birds of the World. 

To be honest, I don't see the difference between the male and female, except for the eye color. Based on the eye color, the Indian gray hornbill I saw was a male. Below, I have photos of African gray hornbills, the first one in Etosha NP in Namibia and the second from Kidepo Valley NP in Uganda. Differences in the bill and casque, alone, make them quite distinguishable from the Indian version. 

Range map for the Indian gray hornbill from Birds of the World. 

One interesting note, it frequently competes with the rose-ringed parakeet for nest-holes and will even eat the parakeet's chicks and throw out the nest lining. 

Orange-Headed Thrush

We were in Keoladeo NP in India with our guide, Ashok, driving in a motorized rickshaw, when Ashok got quite excited about an orange headed bird with a blue body that popped up along the side of the dirt road. "An orange-headed thrush" he said with enthusiasm. I tried to quickly pull up my camera for a photo and the bird disappeared below the berm on the road which bordered on a swamp. The rickshaw stopped, we got out to look over the berm and the bird flew across the road into the swamp on the other side. I could see the bird moving around, then lost it. Ashok asked to borrow my camera and took several photos. One photo worked, the others were blurry. We spent quite a bit more time looking for the elusive bird as it moved about the swampy ground through fallen trees and some brush. I got such a good view of it on the side of the road, just not quick enough with my camera.

An illustration of nominate ssp. citrina from Birds of the World. 

There are about 12 subspecies of the orange-headed thrush, all beautiful, and quite varied. It is often found in damp areas, near streams, in moist broadleaved evergreen woodlands, with a medium-density undergrowth of bushes and ferns. The nominate subspecies, which I saw, has an entirely orange head and underparts, grayish-blue upperparts and wings, slate-colored bill and legs, and white undertail coverts and some on the wings. 

Range from Birds of the World. 

Citrina, the nominate ssp, breeds from northern India east along the Himalayas to eastern Bangladesh and into western and northern Myanmar. It winters further south in India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh. Other ssp are even more beautiful, such as cyanota, which has a white throat and face sides, with two black stripes running downwards from below the eyes. 

The "white-throated" orange-headed thrush, ssp cyanota, illustration from Birds of the World. 

Ssp. melli has the black stripes but the throat and face sides are in-between white and orange. 

Ssp. melli from Birds of the World. 

It is a shy secretive birds usually occurring alone or in pairs. It has a swift, silent flight, but when disturbed will often sit motionless until the threat has passed. Just stunning. I would love to see more of them. 

Knob-Billed Duck

The knob-billed duck is another bird I wanted to see when we went to India this last November, and did see, just not as good a sighting as I'd hoped for. It was a long way off and I couldn't really make it out with my naked eye. It was not until getting home and cropping photos that I could really see what I saw. I was also disappointed that I didn't get a male with a huge knob on its bill. I think one of the birds I saw was a male, but it was always obscured by a female and the knob is very small, which is what happens outside of the breeding season. It was in Keoladeo NP in India and pointed out to me by our guide, Ashok. 

I believe the duck to the back right is a male. 

It is one of the largest species of duck. It has a white head freckled with dark spots, a white neck and underparts. The upperparts are glossy blue-black, with bluish and greenish iridescence, especially prominent on the secondaries (lower arm feathers). The male is larger than the female and has a large black knob on the bill. 

Illustration of female from Birds of the World. 

Illustration of male from Birds of the World. 

Range from Birds of the World. 

Common Chiffchaff

The common chiffchaff is a leaf warbler. It is migratory, wintering in southern and western Europe, southern Asia and north Africa. I saw it in Keoladeo NP, India in November 2025. I saw ssp. tristis, known as the Siberian chiffchaff, which breeds in Siberia and winters in the lower Himalayas, but is also regularly recorded in western Europe in the winter. It is dull, gray or brownish above and whitish below, with little yellow in the plumage, and the buff-white supercilium is often longer than the western subspecies. Birds of the World says it is "so nondescript that wing bars are considered sporty, a splash of yellow is eccentric, and a dash of orange would be unthinkable." 

Illustration of ssp. tristis from Birds of the World. 

I was walking back to our motorized rickshaw when I saw this tiny bird high up in a tree and started taking photos. Our guide, Ashok, told me the name and I had to have him spell it out for me, going over it several times. I'd never heard of it and it seemed like a really weird name for a bird. It is named for its chiff-chaff-chiff-chaff-chiff-chaff song. 

Range from Birds of the World.

Lesser Whitethroat

In Keoladeo NP in India our guide Ashok identified a lesser whitethroat, a lifer for me. It is a widespread Old World warbler  which winters in Africa, just south of the Sahara, and Arabia and India. We saw it in November, so it was obviously wintering there. 

Lesser whitethroat range from Birds of the World. Light blue is wintering and orange is breeding. 

There are six subspecies. The descriptions of where they are located is not great, particularly when you consider that it has a smaller wintering range which means multiple subspecies could be found there. It appears that we could have seen ssp. althaea, Hume's whitethroat, which is found in Iran and southern Turkmenistan to northern Pakistan and central Asia, but it could be several others. Birds of the World has illustrations of five of the subspecies and Hume's looks as much like my photo as any of them. 

Hume's lesser whitethroat, illustration from Birds of the World. 

 

It has a gray back, whitish underparts, a gray head with a darker "bandit mask" through the eyes and a white throat.