India GO
Bird · Ficedula nigrorufa
Black-and-orange flycatcher
IUCN LC · Least concern
A small, almost absurdly bright flycatcher: a black head and wings on a body of deep orange. It holds a tiny territory in shola undergrowth and rarely leaves it.
How to recognise it
Low down, in the darkest part of the undergrowth, where the orange glows. Because it is so territorial, once you find a bird you can find it again in the same few metres.
Where to see it
Ooty & Coonoor
It cannot cross open ground between shola patches, so every fragment of montane forest that is cleared isolates another population.
Sim's Park Coonoor (often) · Government Botanical Garden (in season) · Doddabetta Peak (in season)