The Black-throated Munia or Jerdon's Mannikin (Lonchura kelaarti) is a small passerine

Passerine

A passerine is a bird of the order Passeriformes, which includes more than half of all bird species. Sometimes known as perching birds or, less accurately, as songbirds, the passerines form one of the most diverse terrestrial vertebrate orders: with over 5,000 identified species, it has roughly...

 bird

Bird

Birds are feathered, winged, bipedal, endothermic , egg-laying, vertebrate animals. Around 10,000 living species and 188 families makes them the most speciose class of tetrapod vertebrates. They inhabit ecosystems across the globe, from the Arctic to the Antarctic. Extant birds range in size from...

. This estrildid finch

Estrildid finch

The estrildid finches are small passerine birds of the Old World tropics and Australasia. They can be classified as the family Estrildidae , or as a sub-group within the family Passeridae, which also includes the true sparrows....

 is a resident breeding bird in the hills of southwest India

India

India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...

, the Eastern Ghats

Eastern Ghats

The Eastern Ghats or Eastern Ghauts are a discontinuous range of mountains along India's eastern coast. The Eastern Ghats run from West Bengal state in the north, through Orissa and Andhra Pradesh to Tamil Nadu in the south passing some parts of Karnataka. They are eroded and cut through by the...

 and Sri Lanka

Sri Lanka

Sri Lanka, officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka is a country off the southern coast of the Indian subcontinent. Known until 1972 as Ceylon , Sri Lanka is an island surrounded by the Indian Ocean, the Gulf of Mannar and the Palk Strait, and lies in the vicinity of India and the...

.

Subspecies

The endemic

Endemic (ecology)

Endemism is the ecological state of being unique to a defined geographic location, such as an island, nation or other defined zone, or habitat type; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also found elsewhere. For example, all species of lemur are endemic to the...

 Sri Lankan subspecies, L. k. kelaarti is sometimes considered to as a separate species distinct from L. k. jerdoni of the Western Ghats

Western Ghats

The Western Ghats, Western Ghauts or the Sahyādri is a mountain range along the western side of India. It runs north to south along the western edge of the Deccan Plateau, and separates the plateau from a narrow coastal plain along the Arabian Sea. The Western Ghats block rainfall to the Deccan...

 of India.

Habitat

The Black-throated Munia is a small gregarious bird which feeds mainly on seeds. It frequents open hill woodland and cultivation. The nest is a large domed grass structure in a tree or creepers on a house into which 3-8 white eggs are laid in India, and usually five in Sri Lanka.

Characteristics

The Black-throated Munia is 12 cm in length with a long black tail. The adult of the south Indian has a stubby grey bill, dark brown upperparts and blackish head, breast and wings. L. k. kelaarti has pinkish underparts and rump, and L. k. jerdoni has barred black and white underparts and rump. The sexes are similar, but immature lack the darker head and have uniform underparts.

Commemoration

The binomial commemorates the zoologist Edward Frederick Kelaart

Edward Frederick Kelaart

Lieutenant Colonel Edward Frederick Kelaart was a Ceylonese-born physician and naturalist.Kelaart was of Dutch and German heritage, and served in the Ceylon Medical Service. He was a staff assistant surgeon in Gibraltar from 1843 to 1845, later transferred to Ceylon. He was an active member of the...

 and the name was given by Thomas C. Jerdon

Thomas C. Jerdon

Thomas Caverhill Jerdon was a British physician, zoologist and botanist. He is best remembered for his pioneering works on the ornithology of India...

 in 1863.

Origin

Origin and phylogeny has been obtained by Antonio Arnaiz-Villena et al. Estrildinae may have originated in India and dispersed thereafter (towards Africa and Pacific Ocean habitats).