Greater Short-toed Lark - BirdForum Opus

Subspecies C. b. longipennis
Photo © by Alok Tewari
Gurgaon Rural, Haryana, India, 26 February 2018

Calandrella brachydactyla

Identification

14–15 cm
A short-billed lark with long tertials

Distribution

Photo © by Scottishdude
Track by Lucio del Lobo, Sepulveda, Spain, May, 2010

Europe, Africa, Middle East, Asia
Europe: Scandinavia, Norway, Finland, Denmark, Belgium, France, Portugal, Spain, Ibiza, Mallorca, Gibraltar, Switzerland, Italy, Sicily, Sardinia, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Slovakia, Hungary, Balkans, Slovenia, Croatia, Yugoslavia, Albania, Macedonia, Greece, Crete, Corfu, Malta, Bulgaria, Romania, Moldova
Northern Africa: Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, Egypt
Western Africa: Mauritania, Senegambia, Senegal, Mali, Nigeria, Niger, Chad, Cameroon, Democratic Republic of Congo
Eastern Africa: Sudan, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Djibouti, Somalia, Kenya
Middle East: Turkey, Cyprus, Syria, Lebanon, Israel, Jordan
Arabian Peninsula, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Oman, United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Kuwait, Iraq, Iran
Asia: Russia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia Siberia, Turkestan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Afghanistan, Mongolia, China, Tibet, Inner Mongolia, Nepal, Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, South Korea, Japan
Southeast Asia: Indochina, Myanmar

Taxonomy

Juvenile
Photo © by mikeprince
Belen Plain, Extremadura, Spain, June 2006

Mongolian Short-toed Lark was formerly included in this species.

Subspecies

There are 7 subspecies^[1]:

C. b. brachydactyla:

Mediterranean environs and islands

C. b. hungarica:

Hungary

C. b. rubiginosa:

Northern Africa (Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia); Malta

C. b. woltersi:

North-western Syria and adjacent southern Turkey

C. b. hermonensis:

Sinai Peninsula to extreme southern Turkey and eastern Syria

C. b. artemisiana:

Asia Minor, Transcaucasia and north-western Iran

C. b. longipennis (orientalis):

Caucasus to Ukraine, northern Mongolia and north-eastern China; >eastern Africa

Habitat

Semi-arid farm land, fields, short-grass steppe and desert scrub.

Behaviour

Diet

A wide variety of invertebrates, seeds and green vegetable matter.

Vocalisation

References

Clements, J. F., T. S. Schulenberg, M. J. Iliff, D. Roberson, T. A. Fredericks, B. L. Sullivan, and C. L. Wood. 2017. The eBird/Clements checklist of birds of the world: v2017, with updates to August 2017. Downloaded from http://www.birds.cornell.edu/clementschecklist/download/
Avibase
Handbook of the Birds of the World Alive (retrieved September 2014)
BF Member observations

List of references

Recommended Citation

BirdForum Opus contributors. (2025) Greater Short-toed Lark. In: BirdForum, the forum for wild birds and birding. Retrieved 1 May 2025 from https://www.birdforum.net/opus/Greater_Short-toed_Lark

External Links

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