Common Kingfisher - Neela Ponman ( നീല പൊൻമാൻ )

Ven Neeli - The Most Beautiful Bird in Kerala

The Black Naped Monarch (Hypothymis azurea) – ‘Ven Neeli’ in Malayalam vernacular is a slim and agile passerine bird widely distributed in southern and south-eastern Asia. They are sexually dimorphic.
The adult male bird is about 16 cm long, and is mainly pale azure blue apart from a whitish lower belly. It has a distinctive black patch on the back of the head and a narrow black half collar ("necklace"). The female is duller and lacks the black markings. Its wings and back are greyish-brown. However, several geographically separated breeding populations differ in the extent and shade of markings. The birds occur in tropical forest habitats, singly or in pairs and in small groups.
Populations differ slightly in plumage color and sizes. The bird is widely distributed in deciduous to semi-evergreen forests, bamboo stands, teak plantations and cardamom plantations of Kerala State.

A total of twenty-three sub-species have been recognized. Among these, Indian Black-Naped Blue Monarch (H. a. styani) was originally described as a separate species in the genus Ficedula, found from India and Nepal to southeast China and Vietnam, in which males have very distinct black markings and a whitish abdomen. The subspecies of the H. a. tytleri, from Andaman Island has the underparts blueish- grey. The sub-species form Car Nicobar Island, H. a. idiochroa, has a greyish white belly, while H. a. nicobarica from the southern Nicobars has a smaller and finer bill.
The Black-Naped Monarch breeds across tropical southern Asia from India and Sri Lanka east to Indonesia and the Philippines. This species is usually found in thick forests and other well-wooded habitats. The calls are a sharp and abrupt skrip. The main breeding season in India is in summer from May to September. Two to three eggs are laid in a cup shaped nest placed in the fork of a tree. The nest is built by the female while the male guards. The typical clutch is three eggs, which both parents incubate and both feed the young ones, which hatch after about 12 days.

The Black-Naped Monarch is insectivorous and often hunts by fly-catching. They join mixed-species foraging flocks, being among the most significant members of such flocks in the Kerala part of the Western Ghats and are usually active in the understory of forest canopies. Although they are largely residents, local seasonal movements are known. As the global population is considered stable, it has been listed as ‘Least Concern” on the IUCN Red List