The blackcap babbler (''Turdoides reinwardtii'') is a member of the family

Leiothrichidae The laughingthrushes are a family, Leiothrichidae, of Old World passerine birds. The family contains 133 species and is divided into 16 genera. The species are diverse in size and coloration. These are birds of tropical areas, with the greatest v ...

. The blackcap babbler is a common resident breeding bird in west

Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent after Asia. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 20% of Earth's land area and 6% of its total surfac ...

from

Senegal Senegal, officially the Republic of Senegal, is the westernmost country in West Africa, situated on the Atlantic Ocean coastline. It borders Mauritania to Mauritania–Senegal border, the north, Mali to Mali–Senegal border, the east, Guinea t ...

Cameroon Cameroon, officially the Republic of Cameroon, is a country in Central Africa. It shares boundaries with Nigeria to the west and north, Chad to the northeast, the Central African Republic to the east, and Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, and the R ...

. Its habitat is thick scrub and forest. This

species A species () is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate sexes or mating types can produce fertile offspring, typically by sexual reproduction. It is the basic unit of Taxonomy (biology), ...

, like most babblers, is not migratory, and has short rounded wings and a weak flight. It builds its cup-shaped nest in a tree, concealed in dense masses of foliage. The normal clutch is two or three eggs. These birds have dark grey-brown upperparts. The head is brownish black with a white throat and conspicuous white eye ring. The underparts are white, mottled on the breast and with buff flanks. The blackcap babbler lives in flocks of four to twelve or more, which help to raise the young communally. 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. The main call is a ''cha-ka-ta''. It feeds mainly on insects, but also eats fruit. The binomial commemorates the botanist

Caspar Georg Carl Reinwardt Caspar Georg Carl Reinwardt (5 June 1773 in Lüttringhausen – 6 March 1854 in Leiden) was a Germans, Prussian-born Netherlands, Dutch botanist. He is considered to be the founding father of Bogor Botanical Garden in Indonesia. Biography ...

References

* ''Birds of The Gambia'' by Barlow, Wacher and Disley, *Collar, N. J. & Robson, C. 2007. Family Timaliidae (Babblers) pp. 70 – 291 in; del Hoyo, J., Elliott, A. & Christie, D.A. eds. ''

Handbook of the Birds of the World The ''Handbook of the Birds of the World'' (HBW) is a multi-volume series produced by the Spanish publishing house Lynx Edicions in partnership with BirdLife International. It is the first handbook to cover every known living species of bird. ...

'', Vol. 12. Picathartes to Tits and Chickadees. Lynx Edicions, Barcelona. {{Taxonbar, from=Q1930749 Turdoides Birds of West Africa Birds described in 1831 Taxa named by William Swainson