The Indian White Wagtail from Siberia

by K. G. H. Munidasa

The first bird-ringing camp in the annals of ornithological research in Sri Lanka was held in March 1963, under the aegis of the Ceylon Bird Club.

The ringing was conducted by a team headed by the then Secretary of the Bird Club McLeod Cmeron at a common roosting colony at Galmadu in the Gal Oya Valley when 36 Forest Wagtails, a common migratory species, were netted and ringed.

As the person who was instrumental in organising the ringing camp, I became highly interested in the study of the wagtails, which migrated to the island from Central and North-Central Asia, during the winter period (North-East Monsoon)

Although by then I was able to identify by sight the Indian Forest Wagtail, Eastern Grey Wagtail and many of the Yellow Wagtails in the field, I had not set my eyes on the White Wagtail.

The range

The White Wagtail Motacilla alb is a very widely spread species breeding in different forms almost throughout Europe, North-West Africa and Northern Asia. Four of these forms occur in various parts of the Indian mainland.

According to Hugh Whistler’s Popular Handbook of Indian Birds (1963) vide page 244, the race Motacills flava dukhunensis breeds in West Siberia, whose range extends west.

The Republic of Latvia, a country on the Baltic Coast, declared the White Wagtail its national bird in 1960.

The Indian White Wagtail begins its winter migration about September and October, returning again to its breeding haunts the following April and May, having spread meanwhile throughout the plains of India down to Travancore and perhaps, to the shores of Sri Lanka.

Rare visitor

Since it was first described from Dukhun in India in 1832 W. E. Wait vide page 130 Manual of the Birds of Ceylon (1931) recorded the taking of a specimen of the Indian White Wagtail at Puttalam on the north-western coast, during November 1917 and G. M. Henry, Guide (1955) saw a pair frequenting a lakeside warehouse in Colombo in February 1946, the writer observed several in the Gal Oya Valley and on the East Coast during the winter of 1965/66 (Ceylon Bird Club Notes)

Thus, on the morning of November 10, 1965, I was on my way to work at the sugar Factory, Hingurana on the Gal Oya Sugar Industries, around 6.30. When I was just a hundred yards from the main gate, I saw my first White Wagtail, right on the middle of the busy road.

By the pale grey back, mainly white head and no yellow about its plumage I could reasonably take it for a race of the species. In mid-afternoon I found the identical bird in the crane yard of the factory, and two days later three individuals together, all of them similar in plumage pattern.

In the second week of December, all three were peacefully feeding around the same puddle of rain water in the factory yard at 6.45 a.m.

Shortly afterwards, I noted one of them chasing another and consequently drove it out of the premises. Since then only two remained, always together. During the heavy monsoonal rain at the beginning of December, the pair spent their whole time on the roof of the factory, either looking for prey or merely at rest, preening.

They never came down to the yard, even during high noon, and occasionally I could observe them walking from end to end of the massive roof - approximately a distance of 2-300 feet.

In the mornings, when there was some sunlight, they would fly down to the yard of the factory to feed among the cane residue, seemingly showing a fancy for the puddles of water.

The pair regularly visited a dump of cane trash 300 yards away across the perimeter wall.

They appeared to resent the presence of the Yellow Wagtails in their selected area, and chased out the moment they came across one.

I observed a yellow being harassed by them in a cane field 500 yards from the factory.

Singing

One sunny morning I watched one of the pair singing at a pool of rain water at 7.

The previous night there had been a thunderstorm, and the factory yard was littered with puddles of water. It ran from one puddle to another, singing all the white. Yes, even while feeding.

The singing was akin to that of the Yellow Yagtail in strain, but carried farther and was also sweeter. To the distance it resembled the sub-song of our Magpie Robin (only broken now and again by its normal note) and carried from 25-30 yards.

The following morning one of them was singing at 6.30, which lasted about fifteen minutes.

In mid-January 1966, three White Wagtails were seen in close association. Two of them were identical i.e. head white and the back clear grey in one while the other being less grayish on the back and brownish in general colour, probably a juvenile.

In October that year I spotted a White Wagtail flying over at 5.30 p.m. This could have been a Grey Wagtail on passage, but the flight note gave away its correct identity.

At the end of the month, out of the pair seen together in the factory yard one had a slight black patch on the throat (sign of summer or breeding plumage) and in the other nothing visible. In December both of the pair possessed black throat-patches, which had grown larger and conspicuous by next February.

One morning in March I saw a solitary White Wagtail in a corridor of the sugar secretariat. As I watched it deviated from its ramble and headed towards the sugar store fifty yards away.

Fifteen minutes later when I looked for the bird I found it peeping into a security lamp on the wall of the store building. That was the last I saw of the White Wagtail that year.

More observations

Following my transfer to the Walawe Project in 1974 by my employers, I got ample opportunities of studying the birdlife in the Uda-Walawe region, including the Walawe National Park. On assuming duties in my new assignment, my first chance of observing the White Wagtail came my way in November in the factory yard of the Sri Lanka Sugar Corporation in Uda Walawe.

A male in semi-summer plumage was walking about snapping insects in the paved compound, unconcerned of the workmen moving about. A few days later, I saw another in the compound of an office building, half a mile away. It was wading in the water spilling from an ornamental pond in the premises and picking up insects on the surface. It appeared to be either a female or young male, with the bib or gorget-like mark on chest black, while the ear coverts, side of face and the throat whitish. In a couple of days I came upon two at the same place, who were still in winter plumage.

Since my first sighting of the Indian White Wagtail in the mid-1960s, I may have by now placed on record in the monthly notes of Ceylon Bird Club a mass of first-hand observations on the characteristics and behaviour of this rear migrant bird. More recently, in January and February 1974 to be exact, P. B. Karunaratne of the Colombo Museums, recorded the presence of three White Wagtails in the precinct of the Colombo Jetty.

Following the directions given in the report he had submitted Chairman/Secretary of the Ceylon Bird Club, Thilo Hoffmann visited the Colombo Jetty and made personal observations of the birds for two hours.

He found that one of them was a juvenile, which could readily be recognised by its generally brownish-grey appearance, pale supercilium (mark above eye-brow) no pure white and less markings on the folded wings. One was an adult with clear colours, pure white, black and clean grey, probably a male.

The third bird seemed to be a sub-adult, possibly one year old, or a female. The bib in the last two was similar, but much smaller and less distinct in the juvenile.

During a second visit in February, he found that the juvenile was obviously moulting to adult plumage. The brownish overtone and whitish supersilium were no longer there. On a second observation a week later, white speckles were noticed on the otherwise grayish face, and the bib had also become larger and blacker. A fourth bird (male) he saw on that occasion had already assumed full summer plumage, i.e. black chin, throat and bib in one massive blob.

By March none of the White Wagtails was there and it was taken for granted that all had re-migrated to their breeding grounds in Western Siberia, and farther West.