Motacilla maderaspatensis
Silhouette: Martin Bulla, based on Ren Hathway's illustration · PhyloPic
In 3 days ~60% in a week ~90%
The white-browed wagtail or large pied wagtail (Motacilla maderaspatensis) is a medium-sized bird and is the largest member of the wagtail family. They are conspicuously patterned with black above and white below, a prominent white brow, shoulder stripe and outer tail feathers. White-browed wagtails are native to the Indian subcontinent, common near small water bodies and have adapted to urban environments where they often nest on roof tops. The specific name is derived from the Indian city of Madras (now Chennai).
The white-browed wagtail 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 maderaspatensis. The specific epithet is Modern Latin for the locality, Madras (or Madraspattanam and now Chennai) in southern India. Gmelin's account was based on the "black and white wagtail" that had been described and illustrated in 1713 by the English naturalist John Ray. The species is monotypic: no subspecies are recognised.
The white-browed wagtail is the largest species... Wikipedia →
| # | Park | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Chitwan National Park | 🇳🇵 Nepal | |
| 2 | Mudumalai National Park | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 3 | Bandipur National Park | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 4 | Royal Bardia National Park | 🇳🇵 Nepal | |
| 5 | Nagarhole National Park | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 6 | Jim Corbett National Park | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 7 | Satpura National Park | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 8 | Eravikulam National Park | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 9 | Ranthambore National Park | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 10 | Periyar National Park | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 11 | Gir National Park | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 12 | Keoladeo National Park | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 13 | Kanha National Park | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 14 | Bandhavgarh National Park | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 15 | Royal Manas National Park | 🇧🇹 Bhutan | |
| 16 | Manas National Park | 🇮🇳 India |
| # | City | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Bengaluru | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 2 | Hajipur | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 3 | Vijayawada | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 4 | Hyderabad | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 5 | Coimbatore | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 6 | Tiruchirappalli | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 7 | Lucknow | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 8 | Patna | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 9 | Islamabad | 🇵🇰 Pakistan | |
| 10 | Jamshedpur | 🇮🇳 India |
Possible
About 30% of wildlife watchers report a White-browed Wagtail sighting in Ranthambore National Park on a given day, based on 351 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data from 2019 to 2026. It is the 56th most-seen of the 251 birds we can rate there. Over three days the chance rises to about 60%, and over a week to about 90%, if each day is a fresh chance.
February
In that month about 40% of wildlife watchers report a White-browed Wagtail in Ranthambore National Park on a given day, against about 10% in July and August, the lowest months. That is one of Ranthambore National Park's driest months, with about 5 mm of rain against 270 mm in August.
Between 7 and 10 am
Across all the parks we cover, that three-hour window holds the most White-browed Wagtail sightings with a recorded time, and about 9 in 10 of them come between 6 am and 6 pm: it is a daytime animal.
9th of 16
Of the 16 parks where we can rate White-browed Wagtail sightings, Ranthambore National Park ranks 9th at about 30%. The best odds are in Chitwan National Park (Nepal, about 50%), Mudumalai National Park (India, about 40%) and Bandipur National Park (India, about 40%). All parks ranked.
Same genus: Motacilla
The closest relatives of the White-browed Wagtail that you can see in Ranthambore National Park (genus Motacilla, Wagtails) are Grey Wagtail (about 30%), White Wagtail (about 20%) and Citrine Wagtail (about 10%), with each one's daily chance of a sighting.
GBIF citizen-science records
It is estimated from how often the White-browed Wagtail is recorded against all the birds logged in Ranthambore National Park (351 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.
