White-crowned forktail
species of bird
The white-crowned forktail (Enicurus leschenaulti) is a species of forktail in the family Muscicapidae. Formally described in 1818, it has five subspecies, each occupying a different geographic range. The largest of the forktails, Enicurus leschenaulti, is between 25 and 28 centimetres (9.8 and 11.0 in) long. It has a black throat and breast, black mantle, and largely black wings. The rump and lower back are white, and the bird has a prominent white crown, from which it gets its name. As with other forktails, the tail is long, deeply forked, and banded in black and white. A variety of whistling and clicking calls have been described. Slight morphological differences have been observed between subspecies.
A shy bird, the white-crowned forktail stays near water, and forages on the edges of rivers and streams for invertebrates. Its breeding season is between March and September, and possibly extends till October.
“White-crowned forktail” enters the record as species of bird. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what White-crowned, forktail and species can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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The date and method of observation matter as much as the stated conclusion, especially where classification or consensus has changed. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 23, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1588883. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1818.
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This entry incorporates text from “White-crowned forktail” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.