Emberiza aureola
Silhouette: L. Shyamal · PhyloPic
In 3 days ~10% in a week ~30%
The yellow-breasted bunting (Emberiza aureola) is a passerine bird in the bunting family Emberizidae that is found across the Boreal and East Palearctic. The genus name Emberiza is from Old German Embritz, a bunting. The specific aureola is Latin for "golden". The bird's call is a distinctive zick, and the song is a clear tru-tru, tri-tri.
Until 2004, the International Union for Conservation of Nature considered the yellow-breasted bunting to be a species of least concern. Since 2004, it has been gradually upgraded to a status of Critically Endangered due to rapid drops in population sizes. It is subject to heavy hunting pressure in China, through which most specimens pass during migration.
The yellow-breasted bunting is a small passerine, ranging from 14 to 16 cm (5.5 to 6.3 in) in length, and weighing 17 to 26 g (0.6 to 0.9 oz). For a bunting, it is large and rather stocky. The breeding male has bright white underparts with black flank streaks, brown upperparts, black face and throat bar, and a pink lower mandible. The female has a heavily streaked grey-brown back, and less intensely yellow underparts. She has a whitish face with dark crown, eye and cheek stripes... Wikipedia →
Recording1:07
Russia · 2026
© naturalisttt · iNaturalist · CC BY-NC 4.0
Recording0:27
Russia · 2026
© nadezhda_boiko · iNaturalist · CC BY-NC 4.0
Recording0:08
Russia · 2025
© Сергей · iNaturalist · CC BY-NC 4.0
| # | Park | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Chitwan National Park | 🇳🇵 Nepal |
More parks will be added in future updates.
Rare
Under 5% of wildlife watchers report a Yellow-breasted Bunting sighting in Chitwan National Park on a given day, based on 69 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data from 2019 to 2026. It is the 186th most-seen of the 367 birds we can rate there. Over three days the chance rises to about 10%, and over a week to about 30%, if each day is a fresh chance.
December to February
In those months about 10% of wildlife watchers report a Yellow-breasted Bunting in Chitwan National Park on a given day, against under 5% in March to November, the lowest months. Those are among Chitwan National Park's driest months, with about 20 mm of rain a month against 660 mm in July.
Between 8 and 11 am
Across all the parks we cover, that three-hour window holds the most Yellow-breasted Bunting sightings with a recorded time, and about 8 in 10 of them come between 6 am and 6 pm: it is a daytime animal.
Only Chitwan National Park, in our data
Chitwan National Park is the only park on Wallace's Line with enough records to rate Yellow-breasted Bunting sightings: under 5% of wildlife watchers there report one on a given day.
GBIF citizen-science records
It is estimated from how often the Yellow-breasted Bunting is recorded against all the birds logged in Chitwan National Park (69 verified sightings from 2019 to 2026), calibrated against known sighting rates. Figures are rounded to the nearest 10% because citizen-science data supports honest approximations, not decimals, and months with records from fewer than five people show "—". How it works.
