Curruca melanocephala
Silhouette: Alexis Lours · PhyloPic
In 3 days ~40% in a week ~60%
The Sardinian warbler (Curruca melanocephala) is a common and widespread Sylviidae warbler from the Mediterranean region. Like most Curruca species, it has distinct male and female plumages. The adult male has a grey back, whitish underparts, black head, white throat and red eyes. Plumages are somewhat variable even in the same locality, with the intensity of a reddish hue on upper- and/or underside that varies from absent to (in some subspecies) pronounced. The female is mainly brown above and buff below, with a grey head. The Sardinian warbler's song is fast and rattling, and is very characteristic of the Mediterranean areas where this bird breeds.
The Sardinian warbler 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 wagtails in the genus Motacilla and coined the binomial name Motacilla melanocephala. Gmelin based his entry on a description by the Italian zoologist Francesco Cetti in his book Gli uccelli di Sardegna (The Birds of Sardinia) that was published in 1776. This was the second volume of his Storia naturale di Sardegna... Wikipedia →
| # | Park | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Monfragüe National Park | 🇪🇸 Spain | |
| 2 | Sierra Nevada National Park | 🇪🇸 Spain | |
| 3 | Doñana National Park | 🇪🇸 Spain | |
| 4 | Camargue | 🇫🇷 France | |
| 5 | Sierra de Guadarrama National Park | 🇪🇸 Spain | |
| 6 | Cévennes National Park | 🇫🇷 France | |
| 7 | Pyrénées National Park | 🇫🇷 France | |
| 8 | Ordesa y Monte Perdido National Park | 🇪🇸 Spain | |
| 9 | Picos de Europa National Park | 🇪🇸 Spain |
| # | Zoo / Centre | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Reid Park Zoo | 🇺🇸 United States |
With luck
About 10% of wildlife watchers report a Sardinian Warbler sighting in Istanbul on a given day, based on 620 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data. It is the 40th most-seen of the 233 birds we can rate there. Over three days the chance rises to about 40%, and over a week to about 60%, if each day is a fresh chance.
April–May and July–October
In those months about 20% of wildlife watchers report a Sardinian Warbler in Istanbul on a given day, against under 5% in December to February, the lowest months.
Between 7 and 10 am
Across all the parks we cover, that three-hour window holds the most Sardinian Warbler sightings with a recorded time, and about 7 in 10 of them come between 6 am and 6 pm: it is most active around dawn and dusk.
22nd of 24
Of the 24 cities where we can rate Sardinian Warbler sightings, Istanbul ranks 22nd at about 10%. The best odds are in Ramallah (Palestine, about 80%), Tunis (Tunisia, about 60%) and Barcelona (Spain, about 60%).
GBIF citizen-science records
It is estimated from how often the Sardinian Warbler is recorded against all the birds logged in Istanbul (620 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.
