Rosy Minivet Pericrocotus roseus 粉紅山椒鳥
Category I. Accidental.
IDENTIFICATION
18-20 cm. Between Grey-chinned and Scarlet Minivet in size. Adult male has greyish crown to back and bright rosy rump and uppertail coverts. Forecrown and ear coverts are pale greyish and the stripe through the lores is broad and blackish. Throat white, chest to undertail coverts suffused rosy pink. Wings and coverts blackish, with bright rose broad tips to greater coverts, bases of secondaries (forming wing bar in flight), edges to some primaries, outer two tertials and tail feathers.
Adult female similar to male but greyish-olive above and red replaced by yellow. In HK most resembles Grey-chinned Minivet but differs in being paler and greyer above with a greener rump, paler yellow below, and in having more contrasting dark lores, yellow edges to outer two tertials and a stouter bill.
Apr. 2014, LEE Yat Ming. First-winter male.
First-winter male resembles female but has yellow areas on wing infused with red and variable faint pinkish wash on underparts.
Apr. 2014, LEE Yat Ming.
First-winter male has a small amount of reddish on uppertail coverts and tail feathers.
Birds of a type called ‘stanfordi’ are a little-known and rather variable population first identified by Vaughan and Jones (1913). They resembled female Rosy Minivet but are distinguished in the presence in all plumages of a pale frontal patch and, less obviously, an incomplete collar.
VOCALISATIONS
Typical call is a high-pitched ringing trill that resembles Swinhoe’s Minivet in being higher-pitched and of shorter duration than Ashy Minivet.
DISTRIBUTION & HABITAT PREFERENCE
The sole record occurred on the migrant site of Po Toi.
OCCURRENCE
2014: one on Po Toi on 27 April (Cheung 2019).
BEHAVIOUR, DIET & FORAGING
No observations.
SYSTEMATICS & RANGE
Monotypic. Breeds from the Himalayas east to north Indochina and southwest China; Chinese populations are migratory while others are partially so, and wintering birds can be found from east India through all of Indochina (Taylor 2020, Liu and Chen 2020).
CONSERVATION STATUS
IUCN: Least Concern. Population trend decreasing.
Cheung, T. M. (2019). Rosy Minivet Pericrocotus roseus on Po Toi Island. The first Hong Kong record. Hong Kong Bird Report 2017: 256-258.
Liu, Y. and Y. H. Chen (eds) (2020). The CNG Field Guide to the Birds of China (in Chinese). Hunan Science and Technology Publication House, Changsha.
Taylor, B. (2020). Rosy Minivet (Pericrocotus roseus), version 1.0. In Birds of the World (J. del Hoyo, A. Elliott, J. Sargatal, D. A. Christie, and E. de Juana, Editors). Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Ithaca, NY, USA. https://doi.org/10.2173/bow.rosmin1.01
Vaughan, R. E. and K. H. Jones (1913). The birds of Hong Kong, Macao and the West River or Si Kiang in South-East China, with special reference to their nidification and seasonal movements. Ibis 1913: 17-76, 163-201, 351-384.
