Hair-crested Drongo

About the Hair-crested Drongo

The hair-crested drongo (Dicrurus hottentottus) is an Asian bird of the family Dicruridae. This species was formerly considered conspecific with Dicrurus bracteatus, for which the name "spangled drongo" – formerly used for both – is now usually reserved. Some authorities include the Sumatran drongo (D. sumatranus) in D. hottentottus as subspecies.

It is native from Pakistan, Bangladesh, India, and Bhutan through Indochina to China, Indonesia, and Brunei. Hair-crested drongos move in small flocks and are very noisy. The "spangled drongo", Dicrurus bracteatus, is native on the east coast of Australia and its name is a pejorative slang for a silly person. This may be due to its strange chattering and cackling.

In 1760, French zoologist Mathurin Jacques Brisson included a description of the hair-crested drongo in his Ornithologie based on a specimen that he mistakenly believed had been collected from the Cape of Good Hope in South Africa. He used the French name Le choucas du Cap de Bonne Espérance and the Latin Monedula Capitis Bonae Spei. Although Brisson coined Latin names, these do not conform to the binomial system and are not recognised by the International Commission... Wikipedia →