The rufous-fronted babbler (''Cyanoderma rufifrons'') is a babbler species in the

Old World babbler The Old World babblers or Timaliidae, are a family (biology), family of mostly Old World passerine birds. They are rather diverse in size and coloration, but are characterised by soft, fluffy plumage. These are birds of tropical areas, with the g ...

family. It occurs in the

Eastern Himalaya ] The Eastern Himalayas extend from eastern Nepal across Northeast India, Bhutan, the Tibet Autonomous Region to Yunnan in China and northern Myanmar. The climate of this region is influenced by the monsoon of South Asia from June to September. It ...

n foothills, Myanmar, Thailand, northern

Indochina Mainland Southeast Asia (historically known as Indochina and the Indochinese Peninsula) is the continental portion of Southeast Asia. It lies east of the Indian subcontinent and south of Mainland China and is bordered by the Indian Ocean to th ...

and south to the

Malay Peninsula The Malay Peninsula is located in Mainland Southeast Asia. The landmass runs approximately north–south, and at its terminus, it is the southernmost point of the Asian continental mainland. The area contains Peninsular Malaysia, Southern Tha ...

and the islands of

Sumatra Sumatra () is one of the Sunda Islands of western Indonesia. It is the largest island that is fully within Indonesian territory, as well as the list of islands by area, sixth-largest island in the world at 482,286.55 km2 (182,812 mi. ...

and

Borneo Borneo () is the List of islands by area, third-largest island in the world, with an area of , and population of 23,053,723 (2020 national censuses). Situated at the geographic centre of Maritime Southeast Asia, it is one of the Greater Sunda ...

. The buff-chested babbler is now subsumed into this species.

Taxonomy

The rufous-fronted babbler was formally described in 1873 by the English naturalist

Allan Octavian Hume Allan Octavian Hume, Order of the Bath, CB Indian Civil Service, ICS (4 June 1829 – 31 July 1912) was a British political reformer, ornithologist, civil servant and botanist who worked in British Raj, British India and was the founding spirit ...

based on a specimen that had been collected by Eugene W. Oates on the western slopes of the

Pegu Range The Pegu Range (; Pegu Yoma or Bago Yoma) is a range of low mountains or hillsSeekins, Donald M. (2006) ''Historical dictionary of Burma (Myanmar)'' Scarecrow Press, Lanham, Marylandpage 357 and uplands between the Irrawaddy and the Sittaung R ...

of central

Myanmar Myanmar, officially the Republic of the Union of Myanmar; and also referred to as Burma (the official English name until 1989), is a country in northwest Southeast Asia. It is the largest country by area in Mainland Southeast Asia and has ...

. Hume placed the specimen in the genus '' Stachyris'' and coined the

binomial name In taxonomy, binomial nomenclature ("two-term naming system"), also called binary nomenclature, is a formal system of naming species of living things by giving each a name composed of two parts, both of which use Latin grammatical forms, altho ...

''Stachyris rufifrons''. The specific epithet ''rufifrons'' is

modern Latin Neo-LatinSidwell, Keith ''Classical Latin-Medieval Latin-Neo Latin'' in ; others, throughout. (also known as New Latin and Modern Latin) is the style of written Latin used in original literary, scholarly, and scientific works, first in Italy d ...

meaning "red-fronted", from

Latin Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...

''rufus'' meaning "red" or "rufous" and ''frons'', ''frontis'' meaning "forehead" or "brow". The rufous-fronted babbler is now one of seven babblers placed in the genus '' Cyanoderma'' that was first introduced in 1874 by the Italian zoologist

Tommaso Salvadori Count Adelardo Tommaso Salvadori Paleotti (30 September 1835 – 9 October 1923) was an Italian zoologist and ornithologist. Biography Salvadori was born in Porto San Giorgio, son of Count Luigi Salvadori and Ethelyn Welby, who was English. His ...

. Nine

subspecies In Taxonomy (biology), biological classification, subspecies (: subspecies) is a rank below species, used for populations that live in different areas and vary in size, shape, or other physical characteristics (Morphology (biology), morpholog ...

are recognised: * ''C. r. ambiguum'' ( Harington, 1915) – east Himalayas, northwest Myanmar and northeast India * ''C. r. planicola'' (

Mayr Mayr is a German surname. Notable people with the surname include: * Andrea Mayr (born 1979), Austrian female long-distance runner * Ernst Mayr (1904–2005), German American evolutionary biologist * Franz Xaver Mayr (1875–1965), Austrian gastro ...

, 1941) – northeast Myanmar and southwest China * ''C. r. adjunctum'' ( Deignan, 1939) – north, east Thailand and north Indochina * ''C. r. insuspectum'' (Deignan, 1939) – south Laos * ''C. r. pallescens''

Ticehurst Ticehurst is both a village and a large civil parish in the Rother district of East Sussex, England. The parish lies in the upper reaches of both the Bewl stream before it enters Bewl Water and in the upper reaches of the River Rother flow ...

, 1932 – west Myanmar * ''C. r. rufifrons'' ( Hume, 1873) – southeast Myanmar and west Thailand * ''C. r. obscurum'' Baker, ECS, 1917 – south Myanmar and southwest Thailand * ''C. r. poliogaster'' (Hume, 1880) – south

and north, central

* ''C. r. sarawacense'' Chasen, 1939 – northwest

The first four subspecies on the above list (''ambiguum'', ''planicola'', ''adjunctum'' and ''insuspectum'') were formerly sometimes treated as a separate species, the buff-chested babbler (''Cyanoderma ambiguum''). The binomial name ''Stachyris rodolphei'' was proposed by

Herbert Girton Deignan Herbert Girton Deignan (December 5, 1906 – March 15, 1968) was an American ornithologist who worked extensively on the birds of Thailand. Deignan was born in New Jersey, the son of Harry Francis and Anna Galena. He grew up in Pennsylvania and s ...

in 1939 for three babbler

specimen Specimen may refer to: Science and technology * Sample (material), a limited quantity of something which is intended to be similar to and represent a larger amount * Biological specimen or biospecimen, an organic specimen held by a biorepository f ...

s collected at

Doi Chiang Dao Doi Chiang Dao (, ; , ), also known as Doi Luang Chiang Dao (, ; , ), is a high mountain in Chiang Dao District of Chiang Mai Province, Thailand. It is one of the highest peaks of the Daen Lao Range on the Thai side of the border. Doi Chiang ...

in Thailand. The name is now considered

synonym A synonym is a word, morpheme, or phrase that means precisely or nearly the same as another word, morpheme, or phrase in a given language. For example, in the English language, the words ''begin'', ''start'', ''commence'', and ''initiate'' are a ...

ous with the

nominate subspecies In biological classification, subspecies (: subspecies) is a rank below species, used for populations that live in different areas and vary in size, shape, or other physical characteristics ( morphology), but that can successfully interbreed. ...

''C. r. rufifrons''.

Description

It is buff-brown with paler brown underparts and a dull rufous crown. Its upper wings, tail,

supercilium The supercilium is a plumage feature found on the heads of some bird species. It is a stripe which runs from the base of the bird's beak above its eye, finishing somewhere towards the rear of the bird's head.Dunn and Alderfer (2006), p. 10 Also k ...

and

lore Lore may refer to: * Folklore, acquired knowledge or traditional beliefs * Oral lore or oral tradition, orally conveyed cultural knowledge and traditions Places * Loré, former French commune * Loré (East Timor), a city and subdistrict in La ...

s are whitish-grey. It is long and weighs . Its song is a high-pitched ''tuh tuh-tuh-tuh-tuh-tuh''.

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q28917029, from2=Q22103025 rufous-fronted babbler Birds of Eastern Himalaya Birds of East India Birds of Southeast Asia Birds of Yunnan rufous-fronted babbler Taxonomy articles created by Polbot