Asian Brown Flycatcher

Asian Brown Flycatcher (Muscicapa latirostris) is a small plain grey-brown flycatcher with whitish underparts, a pale eye-ring and a broad-based dark bill. Body shape, bill structure, plumage pattern and voice provide the strongest field characters. Age, sex and season may alter its appearance, so identification should combine several features and careful direct field comparisons with similar species in the same habitat (Wikipedia, general species account).

It breeds in Japan, eastern Siberia and the Himalayas, makes short sorties from forest perches to catch flying insects and migrates to tropical southern Asia from India east to Indonesia. Its movements and social behaviour vary through the year, with breeding birds generally more dispersed and non-breeding birds gathering where food is concentrated. Japanese records place it within the country's documented avifauna as a resident, migrant or visitor (Wikipedia, general species account; Wildlife of Japan occurrence records).