Red-billed Starling

Red-billed Starling

Spodiopsar sericeus

Silhouette: Rafael Maia · PhyloPic

LCLeast ConcernNTVUENCR
Daily sighting probability ~20% · Possible
at Changzhou

In 3 days ~40% in a week ~70%

9 Verified sightings at Changzhou
December Best month
☀️ Diurnal When it's spotted

About the Red-billed Starling

The red-billed starling (Spodiopsar sericeus) is a species of starling in the family Sturnidae. It is found in south and southeastern China. The red-billed starling was formally described in 1789 by the German naturalist Johann Friedrich Gmelin in his revised and expanded edition of Carl Linnaeus's Systema Naturae. He placed it with the starlings in the genus Sturnus and coined the binomial name Sturnus sericeus. The specific epithet sericeus is Medieval Latin meaning "silken". Gmelin based his account on the "silk starling" from China that had been described and illustrated in 1776 by the English naturalist Peter Brown from a specimen owned by the collector Marmaduke Tunstall.

The red-billed starling was formerly placed in the genus Sturnus. A molecular phylogenetic study published in 2008 found that the genus was polyphyletic. In the reoganisation to create monophyletic genera, the red-billed starling and the white-cheeked starling were moved to the resurrected genus Spodiopsar that had been introduced in 1889 by Richard Bowdler Sharpe. The species is monotypic: no subspecies are recognised. Wikipedia →

Sounds

Begging call1:01

China · 2025

© Bo Shunqi 薄顺奇 · XC1174977 · CC BY-NC-SA 4.0

Call0:08

China · 2021

© Geoff Carey · XC820828 · CC BY-NC-SA 4.0

Flight call0:14

China · 2022

© Ray Tsu 诸仁 · XC729388 · CC BY-NC-SA 4.0

Global Distribution

Parks Where Found

# Park Country Daily sighting probability

More parks will be added in future updates.

Cities Where Found

# City Country Daily sighting probability
1 Nanchang 🇨🇳 China
~60%
2 Jinhua 🇨🇳 China
~60%
3 Wuhan 🇨🇳 China
~50%
4 Hefei 🇨🇳 China
~40%
5 Ningbo 🇨🇳 China
~40%
6 Chengdu 🇨🇳 China
~30%
7 Nanjing 🇨🇳 China
~30%
8 Shanghai 🇨🇳 China
~30%
9 Hangzhou 🇨🇳 China
~20%
10 Chongqing 🇨🇳 China
~20%

Zoos & Centres Where Found

# Zoo / Centre Country
1 Beijing Wildlife Park 🇨🇳 China In captivity

Before you go

What are the chances of seeing a Red-billed Starling in Changzhou?

Possible

About 20% of wildlife watchers report a Red-billed Starling sighting in Changzhou on a given day, based on 9 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data. It is the 14th most-seen of the 17 birds we can rate there. Over three days the chance rises to about 40%, and over a week to about 70%, if each day is a fresh chance.

What time of day is best to see a Red-billed Starling?

Between 3 and 6 pm

Across all the parks we cover, that three-hour window holds the most Red-billed Starling sightings with a recorded time, and about 9 in 10 of them come between 6 am and 6 pm: it is a daytime animal.

Is Changzhou the best place to see a Red-billed Starling?

17th of 31

Of the 31 cities where we can rate Red-billed Starling sightings, Changzhou ranks 17th at about 20%. The best odds are in Nanchang (China, about 60%), Jinhua (China, about 60%) and Wuhan (China, about 50%).

Where does the Red-billed Starling sighting chance come from?

GBIF citizen-science records

It is estimated from how often the Red-billed Starling is recorded against all the birds logged in Changzhou (9 verified sightings), 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.

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