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Indian Roller (1 Viewer)

Carol Rushton

Carol Rushton

Well-known member
Following the recent taxonomic changes , I am currently updating my World List.

I have seen Indian Roller in Sri Lanka, Nepal and India.

Please can someone point me in the best direction, so I can work out which I have seen and where.

I am clear on the Sri Lankan one, but am unsure where it becomes Indochinese Roller.

I have looked at the Bird Forum Opus, but that is not yet updated post the split and I do not subscribe to HBW Alive.

Thank you,

Kind regards, Carol
 
Last edited:
Carol Rushton said:
Following the recent taxonomic changes , I am currently updating my World List.

I have seen Indian Roller in Sri Lanka, Nepal and India.

Please can someone point me in the best direction, so I can work out which I have seen and where.

I am clear on the Sri Lankan one, but am unsure where it becomes Indochinese Roller.

I have looked at the Bird Forum Opus, but that is not yet updated post the split and I do not subscribe to HBW Alive.

Thank you,


From HBW Alive:

Indochinese Roller: E Nepal, Bhutan and NE India (Bihar, Assam) E to SC China (S Sichuan, Yunnan), and S to peninsular Thailand and Indochina for

Indian Roller: C. b. benghalensis – SE Arabia (N United Arab Emirates, N Oman), and E Iraq through S Iran and N Pakistan E to Bangladesh, S to Maharashtra; one record in NE Afghanistan (Jalalabat).
C. b. indicus – C India (from S Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh) S to Sri Lanka.

Seems to be some sympatry in south-east Nepal, southern Bhutan and adjacent parts of India and northern Bangladesh.

Hope this helps - Ian
Click to expand...
 
You really need to have seen one in e.g Vietnam ( like I did ;) ) where there is no overlap if you want an armchair tick.

If you download the free programme, Scythebill, the range of all species / races is given.
 
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andyadcock said:
You really need to have seen one in e.g Vietnam ( like I did ;) ) where there is no overlap if you want an armchair tick.

If you download the free programme, Scythebill, the range of all species / races is given.
Click to expand...

Yep, but... while I do put it in a bit of research, it's entirely possible for me to get things wrong, especially for these new splits where ranges are a bit uncertain. Here, specifically, I took the assumption that Indian Roller has not reached Bhutan, and I may have made a mistake there?
 
The best way to work it out is based on descriptions or photos (for observations in the past). If you haven't got those, I fear you are trying to write something down that is unsure. Indochinese roller is strikingly different from Indian Roller, although a zone of intergradation exists. I have not seen any birds in that zone, but I do appreciate the clear differences between the newly split species even before they got split, so I always noted the ssp.

For observations in the future, always note down subsspecies based on description, or if not available or impossible to distiguish, on range.
 
Good morning, everyone.

Thank you for all of your very helpful replies.

I will check through photographs taken, to see if any are helpful.

Temmie is right .

I did a lot of pre-preparation for all of the trips, but my Field notes are not descriptive enough to be clear.

It is difficult when you are seeing , typically, well over 250 birds, in a short space of time. It's like speed birding.....

I was clearly, with hindsight, not as prepared as Temmie is for his trips...... as I didn't know all of the possible ssp and their features.

Kind regard to all, Carol
 
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