Monday, February 23, 2015

Great Eared-nightjar (Vagrant Nightjars (Family: Caprimulgidae) recorded in Sri Lanka)

      Birds that appear outside their normal range are known as vagrants. This post summarizes up to date published sight records of vagrants of the family Caprimulgidae (Nightjars) in Sri Lanka.

      Great Eared-nightjar (Eurostopodus macrotis)
First and only record of the occurrence of Great eared-nightjar in Sri Lanka is based on an exhausted and injured bird captured in a house near the coast at Kaluthara on 12th March 2006 by W.C. Chamila soysa (Soysa W.C.C. et. al., 2007).  Identification was confirmed by Deepal Warakagoda and Uditha Hettige (Siriwardana, U., 2007). Bird subsequently died and specimen was deposited at the national museum.

References:
Siriwardana, U., 2007. Report of the Ceylon Bird Club 2006 Loris, 24(5 & 6), 50-56
Soysa W.C.C.,  Amarasinghe A.A.T and Karunarathna D.M.S.S. 2007.  A record of the Great Eared Nightjar Eurostopodus macrotis Vigors, 1831 (Aves: Caprimulgidae) from Sri Lanka Siyoth 2(1) 40-42