Yellow-billed babbler

The Yellow-billed Babbler, Turdoides affinis, is an Old World babbler. The Old World babblers are a large family of Old World passerine birds characterised by soft fluffy plumage. These are birds of tropical areas, with the greatest variety in southeast Asia.

The Yellow-billed Babbler is a common resident breeding bird in Sri Lanka and southern India. Its habitat is scrub and cultivation. This species, like most babblers, is not migratory, and has short rounded wings and a weak flight.

It builds its nest in a tree, concealed in dense masses of foliage. The normal clutch is two to four greenish blue eggs, although up to five may be laid by birds in the hills of Sri Lanka.

These birds have grey brown upperparts, grey throat and breast with some mottling, and a pale buff belly. The head and nape are grey. The race T. a. taprobanusi of Sri Lanka is rufous beneath, and more heavily streaked on the throat and breast. It resembles Jungle Babbler, Turdoides striatus, but that species does not occur on the island.

The Yellow-billed Babbler lives in flocks of seven to ten or more. It is a noisy bird, and the presence of a flock may generally be known at some distance by the continual chattering, squeaking and chirping produced by its members. It feeds mainly on insects, but also eats fruit.

• Birds of India by Grimmett, Inskipp and Inskipp, ISBN 0-691-04910-6
• A Field Guide to the Birds of the Indian Subcontinent by Kazmierczak and van Perlo, ISBN 1873403792