Common Drongos

Today’s another chance for me to appreciate Common Drongos. They have distinctive forked tails and intense red eyes set in deep black plumage.

They eat butterflies, termites and grasshoppers and live in woodland and savannah.

Their favourite behaviour of mine is their vocal mimicry. They have perfected vocalising the alarm calls of various other species of birds. Calling makes the other species flee and the Common Drongo can then steal the food they were consuming. It’s kleptoparasitism without the need for a physical battle. If the call doesn’t work, then they will attack other species. They are the Omar character from The Wire at his most threatening.

They have also been hear mewing like a cat and alarm-calling like a Meerkat.

A particularly impressive part of their deceptive kleptoparasitism is that they also give an ‘all-clear’ call, so the other species can return to feeding, which minimises the disruption to their foraging.

Evolution. It’s a genius.