Myophonus castaneus
Silhouette: Martin Bulla, based on François Desbordes' illustration · PhyloPic
In 3 days ~50% in a week ~80%
The brown-winged whistling thrush (Myophonus castaneus), also known as the Sumatran whistling thrush or chestnut-winged whistling thrush, is a passerine bird belonging to the whistling thrush genus Myophonus in the family Muscicapidae. It is endemic to the island of Sumatra in Indonesia. In the past, it has often been lumped together with the Javan whistling thrush (M. glaucinus) and Bornean whistling thrush (M. borneensis) as the "Sunda whistling thrush" (M. glaucinus) but it is now often regarded as a separate species based on differences in plumage and measurements.
It is about 25 centimetres long. The black bill has an average depth of 7.3 millimetres, slenderer than the bills of the Bornean and Javan whistling thrushes. The legs and feet are dark brown. The adult male has a dark blue head, breast and shoulders with the rest of the plumage being chestnut. The adult female and immature are mostly dull chestnut-brown with a blue patch on the shoulder. The Bornean and Javan whistling thrushes lack any chestnut coloration.
It has a loud whistling call and a harsh grating call. It occurs in montane forest from 400 to 1500 metres above sea-level. It is usually found near streams and typically keeps to the middle and subcanopy layers of the forest. It is a scarce bird and is believed to be declining as a result of deforestation. Wikipedia →
Call0:20
Indonesia · 2026
© Ken Behrens · XC1164419 · CC BY-NC-SA 4.0
| # | Park | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Kerinci Seblat National Park | 🇮🇩 Indonesia |
More parks will be added in future updates.
Possible
About 20% of wildlife watchers report a Chestnut-winged Whistling-Thrush sighting in Kerinci Seblat National Park on a given day, based on 153 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data from 2019 to 2026. It is the 44th most-seen of the 203 birds we can rate there. Over three days the chance rises to about 50%, and over a week to about 80%, if each day is a fresh chance.
July–September and November
In those months about 30% of wildlife watchers report a Chestnut-winged Whistling-Thrush in Kerinci Seblat National Park on a given day, against about 10% in February, April, June and October, the lowest months. January has too few records to rate.
Between 2 and 5 am
Across all the parks we cover, that three-hour window holds the most Chestnut-winged Whistling-Thrush sightings with a recorded time, and about 6 in 10 of them come between 6 pm and 6 am: it is most active around dawn and dusk.
Only Kerinci Seblat National Park, in our data
Kerinci Seblat National Park is the only park on Wallace's Line with enough records to rate Chestnut-winged Whistling-Thrush sightings: about 20% of wildlife watchers there report one on a given day.
Same genus: Myophonus
The closest relatives of the Chestnut-winged Whistling-Thrush that you can see in Kerinci Seblat National Park (genus Myophonus, Whistling-Thrushes) are Shiny Whistling-Thrush (about 40%) and Blue Whistling-Thrush (about 20%), with each one's daily chance of a sighting.
GBIF citizen-science records
It is estimated from how often the Chestnut-winged Whistling-Thrush is recorded against all the birds logged in Kerinci Seblat National Park (153 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.
