Dark blue flycatcher with orangey throat and pale belly, tail somewhat rounded when spread. Nominate race is rather glossy dark blue-grey above, slightly darker on head; flight-feathers blackish with paler edgings, tail blackish, with variable whitish fringe on outer rectrices: chin, throat and breast rich orange-buff, lower underparts whitish; iris dark brown, sometimes whitish eyering (often most marked as crescent below eye); bill black to blue-black or greyish-black, sometimes dark tip and cutting edge; legs grey to black. Female is similar to male but paler and less glossy above, slightly paler below; very like M. rubecula female but distinguished mainly by pale lores, richer blue-grey upperparts, richer coloration on throat and breast, whitish eye-crescent. Immature is like female but with buff margins of flight-feathers, pale tipping on greater upperwing-coverts, pale base of bill. Race fulviventris has greyish-blue (not glossy bluish-black) crown, with throat and breast much as nominate, but rufous (not white) belly, flanks, undertail-coverts and underwing-coverts; mimikae is like nominate but larger, paler and less richly toned, those in Darwin area on N Australia (but apparently not elsewhere) often having distinctive prominent whitish lores.
Not Threatened
Dark blue flycatcher with orangey throat and pale belly, tail somewhat rounded when spread. Nominate race is rather glossy dark blue-grey above, slightly darker on head; flight-feathers blackish with paler edgings, tail blackish, with variable whitish fringe on outer rectrices: chin, throat and breast rich orange-buff, lower underparts whitish; iris dark brown, sometimes whitish eyering (often most marked as crescent below eye); bill black to blue-black or greyish-black, sometimes dark tip and cutting edge; legs grey to black. Female is similar to male but paler and less glossy above, slightly paler below; very like M. rubecula female but distinguished mainly by pale lores, richer blue-grey upperparts, richer coloration on throat and breast, whitish eye-crescent. Immature is like female but with buff margins of flight-feathers, pale tipping on greater upperwing-coverts, pale base of bill. Race fulviventris has greyish-blue (not glossy bluish-black) crown, with throat and breast much as nominate, but rufous (not white) belly, flanks, undertail-coverts and underwing-coverts; mimikae is like nominate but larger, paler and less richly toned, those in Darwin area on N Australia (but apparently not elsewhere) often having distinctive prominent whitish lores.
15 – 15.5 cm; 12 g
Taxonomy: Platyrhynchos ruficollis Vieillot, 1818, “Nouvelle Hollande”; error = Timor. Distinctive race fulviventris possibly a separate species. Three subspecies recognized. (source: Handbook of the Birds of World)
Subspecies and Distribution:
- * ruficollis (Vieillot, 1818) - islands in Flores Sea, also S & E Lesser Sundas (Sumba E to Timor, Lomblen E to Damar). * fulviventris P. L. Sclater, 1883 - Tanimbar Is. * mimikae Ogilvie-Grant, 1911 - coastal S New Guinea (R Mimika E to Port Moresby area), Aru Is, islands in Torres Strait (including Daru and Boigu), and N & NE Australia (from Kimberley E along coast to C Cape York and NE & E Queensland).
Mangroves, relict monsoon forest, paperbark (Malaleuca) swamp, coastal vine thickets, coastal lowland woodland, and inland riparian woodland along major tropical rivers, where it may be seen in bamboo thickets.
Food arthropods, especially insects, also spiders (Araneae); some molluscs. Usually singly in non-breeding season, or in pairs in breeding season; may join mixed-species flocks with Red-headed honeyeaters (Myzomela erythrocephala), Yellow White-eyes (Zosterops luteus) and gerygones (Gerygone). Forages mainly in middle and lower levels of vegetation, but will forage from ground to canopy level. Often perches quietly under dense cover in mangrove forests and thickets and adjacent vegetation; perches upright, continually quivering tail. Darts out to snatch insects from trunks/branches, foliage or ground, and then returns to perch; gleans items by running its bill sideways along leaf. A rather stolid species, remaining more within cover, and less active than M. rubecula; less prone to flycatch from perch than is that species, and tends to keep lower, within 2 – 3 m of ground. Shivers tail, but less often than does M. rubecula.
Mainly Jul – Feb (peak in Oct), but poorly known. Nest built by both sexes, a shallow cup of bark strips, plant fibres and spider webs, lined with grass or tendrils, sometimes decorated with lichen, moss or bark, placed 0,5 – 3 m above tide level in mangroves or over stream. Clutch 2 – 3 eggs, white with umber and slate spots and blotches in belt around upper quarter (larger end unmarked), 18,7 x 13,5 mm; no information on incubation and nestling periods. Nests parasitized by Brush Cuckoo (Cacomantis variolosus).