New species of white bellied drongo found - via Mark Raines

Anwar Ali

A species of drongo, not seen by experts in the country before, has been spotted in Rajshahi city's Shimla Park recently.

The bird, found by a group of bird-watchers, has a distinctive white belly and vent.

After examining its size, black upper side gradually fading into a shade of brown and other features, ornithologists identified it as an adult white-bellied drongo.

“The discovery means that the bird has now extended its habitat to Bangladesh, which is very important to the country's natural biodiversity,” eminent ornithologist Reza Khan, who scrutinised the pictures taken by bird-watchers, told The Daily Star.

Known as Dicrurus caerulescens, the bird is believed to be a resident of India and Sri Lanka, he said.

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Sly Birds Cleverly 'Cry Wolf' to Steal Food

By Stephanie Pappas, Senior Writer | May 01, 2014 02:00pm ET

The red-eyed, black-feathered fork-tailed drongo is an irrepressible mimic, capable of reproducing the calls of everything from other birds to mongoose-like meerkats. Now, a new study finds that these drongo birds are strategic copycats: They "cry wolf" about potential danger, startling other animals and stealing their food.

What's more, drongos (Dicrurus adsimilis) alter their cries to keep their targets from becoming inured to the trick.

This ability to change up calls when one of the calls isn't working may be an evolutionary way to get around the problem the little boy in Aesop's fable ran into: If you raise the alarm about danger too many times, eventually, no one listens. The problem plagues any animal that uses a deceptive strategy, said study researcher Tom Flower, a behavioral ecologist at the Percy FitzPatrick Institute of African Ornithology.

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