Common Tailorbird

Description:

he Common Tailorbird (Orthotomus sutorius) is a songbird found across tropical Asia. Popular for its nest made of leaves "sewn" together and immortalized by Rudyard Kipling in his Jungle Book, it is a common resident in urban gardens. Although shy birds that are usually hidden within vegetation, their loud calls are familiar and give away their presence. They are distinctive in having a greenish upper body plumage, long upright tail and the rust coloured forehead and crown. This passerine bird is typically found in open farmland, scrub, forest edges and gardens. Tailorbirds get their name from the way their nest is constructed. The edges of a large leaf are pierced and sewn together with plant fibre or spider silk to make a cradle in which the actual nest is built. Like most warblers, the Common Tailorbird is insectivorous. The song is a loud cheeup-cheeup-cheeup with variations across the populations. The disyllabic calls are repeated often.

Notes:

In culture Rudyard Kipling in Rikki-Tikki-Tavi, one of his Jungle Book stories, includes a tailorbird couple, Darzee (which means "tailor" in Urdu) and his wife, as two of the key characters. Darzee's wife is said to have feigned injury, but this behaviour is unknown in this species. The local names of the bird in India include phutki (Hindi) and tuntuni (Bengali). A classic book of children's folk tales in Bengali by Upendrakishore Ray is titled "Tuntunir Boi".