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Black Drongo | Dicrurus macrocercus
Koningsdrongo | Drongo real
A slim, entirely glossy black songbird with a long, deeply forked tail, in South Asia one of the most familiar birds of fields, roadsides and villages. In the region it is a rare vagrant from the east, mainly in the United Arab Emirates and Oman, where a pair has recently started breeding in Dubai.
Voice
Noisy: a harsh, metallic tiu-tiu and a disyllabic tee-hee recalling Shikra; also harsh chattering and good imitations of other birds. Sings mainly in the half-light before dawn.
Recording: Ujjal Kishor De — CC BY-SA 4.0 · shortened to the first 60 s, mono · xeno-canto
Identification
28–31 cm, more than half of it tail. Adults are entirely black with a blue gloss on head, mantle and breast; the long tail is deeply forked, the outer feathers slightly curled outward at the tip. There is usually a small white spot at the gape. Eye dark red, bill and legs black. Juveniles and first-winter birds are duller blackish-brown with white fringes on the belly and undertail coverts, giving a scaly underside; their tail is less deeply forked. Perches upright on wires, posts or the backs of cattle, sallying for insects in the air or on the ground.
Confusion species
Ashy Drongo (Dicrurus leucophaeus), another vagrant from Asia, is slate-grey rather than glossy black, with a red eye, no white gape spot and a narrower, longer tail; first-winter Black Drongos with pale underparts are best told by the contrast between a black upper breast and a white-scaled belly. Fork-tailed Drongo (Dicrurus adsimilis) from Africa has a less deeply forked tail and pale inner webs to the flight feathers in flight; it has not been reliably recorded in the region. Common Myna (Acridotheres tristis) and Common Starling (Sturnus vulgaris) have short tails and yellow or pale bills.
Habitat
Open country with scattered trees, fields and pastures, roadsides with wires, and in the region mainly parks, golf courses, gardens and irrigated fields with grassy open ground and perches. Hunts large insects taken in the air or from the ground; likes to follow cattle or mowers.
Where the bird is most at home, classified by the habitats of North Africa and the Middle East.
Range and movements
A rare vagrant to the region. In the United Arab Emirates about seventeen were recorded between 1986 and 2021, most in parks and fields around Dubai, a few at Abu Dhabi, Fujairah and Ras al-Khaimah; in Mushrif Park, Dubai, a pair bred in 2023 (possibly already in 2022), the first breeding record for Arabia. In Oman seven records were known up to 2013. Elsewhere in the region it has, as far as known, not been reliably recorded; an uncertain drongo at Aden in 1946 was not identified to species. Beyond the region it is resident from south-east Iran and Pakistan through India and Sri Lanka to southern China, Taiwan and Java; northern populations are migratory.
How and when to look
The best chance is in the parks of Dubai, where the Mushrif Park birds have been seen fairly regularly in recent years. Elsewhere, in winter check irrigated parks, golf courses and farmland in the Emirates and northern Oman for a black bird with a long forked tail on a wire or post.
Conservation status
Not globally threatened and abundant in Asia. There is no established population in the region, but the recent breeding in Dubai, where the birds seem to stay year-round, may mark the start of a small colonisation. Confusion with other drongos makes photographic documentation desirable.
Scientific name
Dicrurus macrocercus | Vieillot, 1817
Vieillot described the species in 1817 and placed it straight away in the genus where it still stands. The genus Dicrurus was introduced in 1816 by Vieillot. Dicrurus comes from the Greek dikros, 'forked', and oura, 'tail' — for the forked tail of most drongos. macrocercus is Greek for 'long-tailed', from makros 'long' and kerkos 'tail'. The specimen the first description was based on came from Chennai, India.