Dark-sided Flycatcher

Dark-sided Flycatcher Muscicapa sibirica was only seen on this one day of the tour near the main road leading to the top of the Kaeng Krachan National Park. The bird was flycatching from a bare branch over the road returning to the same place therefore making it easy to take a photograph. You can see one of the key identification features of this species in the photograph, the dark undertail covert centres.

Dark-sided Flycatcher is a small passerine bird belonging to the genus Muscicapa in the Old World flycatcher family Muscicapidae. It has a wide distribution in Asia with northern birds migrating south for the winter. It is also known as the Siberian Flycatcher or Sooty Flycatcher, although the latter name is also used for the Sooty Flycatcher M. infuscata of Africa.

The wintering range includes north-east India, Bangladesh, southern China, Taiwan and South-east Asia as far as Sumatra, Java, Borneo and the Philippines (Palawan and Culion). Vagrant birds have been recorded in Alaska, Iceland and Bermuda.

It inhabits coniferous and mixed forest and woodland and is sometimes seen in plantations, parks and gardens. It typically occurs in mountainous regions, reaching 4,000 metres above sea-level in some areas. (Note that my previous sighting of this species was above 3,000 metres in Nepal on an Annapurna trek in 2009 / jc).

Source: Wikipedia