Description
This is a large pipit at 15 cm, but is otherwise an undistinguished looking bird, mainly streaked grey-brown above and pale below with breast streaking. It is long legged with a long tail and a long dark bill. Sexes are similar. Summer and winter plumages are similar. Young birds are more richly coloured below than adults and have the pale edges to the feather's of the upper parts more conspicuous with more prominent spotting on the breast. The population waitei from northwestern India and Pakistan is pale while the population malayensis from the Western Ghats is larger, darker and more heavily streaked with nominate rufulus intermediate.
In winter some care must be taken to distinguish this from other pipits that winter in the area, such as Richard's Pipit, Anthus richardi and Blyth's Pipit, Anthus godlewskii. Paddyfield Pipit is smaller and dumpier, has shorter looking tail and has a weaker fluttering flight. The usually uttered characteristic "chip-chip-chip" call is quite different from usual calls of Richard's Pipit (explosive "shreep") and Blyth's Pipit (nasal "pschreen"). Tawny Pipit has less streaking on the mantle and has a black loreal stripe and a longer tail. The Western Ghats population can appear very similar to the Nilgiri Pipit.
Read more about this topic: Paddyfield Pipit
Famous quotes containing the word description:
“Do not require a description of the countries towards which you sail. The description does not describe them to you, and to- morrow you arrive there, and know them by inhabiting them.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“God damnit, why must all those journalists be such sticklers for detail? Why, they’d hold you to an accurate description of the first time you ever made love, expecting you to remember the color of the room and the shape of the windows.”
—Lyndon Baines Johnson (1908–1973)
“He hath achieved a maid
That paragons description and wild fame;
One that excels the quirks of blazoning pens.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)