Oriental White-Eye

The oriental white-eye (灰腹绣眼鸟) is a small passerine bird in the white-eye family. Known as Kelicap Kacamata Biasa in Malay, they are easily identified by the distinctive white eye-ring and overall yellowish upper parts. It is a resident breeder in open woodland in tropical Asia east from India to China and Indonesia.

This bird is small (about 8–11 cm long) with yellowish olive upper parts, a white eye ring, yellow throat and vent. The belly is whitish grey but may have yellow in some subspecies. The sexes look similar.

Oriental white-eye

These white-eyes are sociable, forming flocks which only separate on the approach of the breeding season. They are highly arboreal and only rarely descend to the ground. The breeding season is February to September but April is the peak breeding season and the compact cup nest is a placed like a hammock on the fork of a branch. The nest is made of cobwebs, lichens and plant fibre. The nest is built in about 4 days and the two pale blue eggs are laid within a couple of days of each other. The eggs hatch in about 10 days. Both sexes take care of brooding the chicks which fledge in about 10 days.

Though mainly insectivorous, the Oriental White-eye will also eat nectar and fruits of various kinds.They pollinate flower when they visit them for flower insects (such as thrips) and possibly nectar (questioned) that form their diet. Their predators include bats and birds such as the White-throated Kingfisher.

Though I have been doing bird photography for a few years, I only came across this bird one evening a few days ago when it perched on a wire in front of my house. Bored by nothing much to do during the Movement Control Order, I was standing near my house gate taking photos of anything that caught my fancy. The joy I got from being able to photograph this bird is akin to a Pokemon fan being able to catch a new monster in his quest to catch ‘em all.