| Himalayan Bluetail | |
|---|---|
| Male at the summit of Doi Inthanon, Thailand | |
| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Aves |
| Order: | Passeriformes |
| Family: | Muscicapidae |
| Genus: | Tarsiger |
| Species: | T. rufilatus |
| Binomial name | |
| Tarsiger rufilatus (Hodgson, 1845) |
|
| Synonyms | |
|
Tarsiger cyanurus rufilatus |
|
The Himalayan Bluetail or Himalayan Red-flanked Bush-robin (Tarsiger rufilatus) is a small passerine bird that was formerly classed as a member of the thrush family Turdidae, but is now more generally considered to be an Old World flycatcher, Muscicapidae.
It is a short-distance altitudinal migrant species, breeding in mixed coniferous forest with undergrowth at 3,000–4,400 m altitude in the Himalaya and southwestern China and wintering at 1,500–2,500 m. It is insectivorous. It is closely related to the Red-flanked Bluetail and was generally treated as a subspecies of it in the past, but as well as differing in its migratory behaviour (Red-flanked Bluetail is a long-distance migrant), it also differs in the more intense blue colour of the adult males and the greyer colour of the females and immatures.[1][2]