Monticola rufiventris
Silhouette: Martin Bulla, based on François Desbordes' illustration · PhyloPic
In 3 days ~30% in a week ~50%
The chestnut-bellied rock thrush (Monticola rufiventris) is a species of passerine bird in the Old World flycatcher family Muscicapidae. The chestnut-bellied rock thrush is 21–23 cm (8.3–9.1 in) in overall length and weighs 48–61 g (1.7–2.2 oz). The male has a blue-grey crown and upperparts with darker lores and throat. The undersides are deep chestnut. The female has dull grey-brown upperparts and scalloped slate-grey with buffy-white underparts. The eyering and the post-auricular patch are whitish-buff.
Its natural habitat is temperate forests. It is an altitudanal migrant and experiences Zugunruhe strongly the night before migration. It is native to the Himalayas, Purvanchal Range and southern China; some birds winter to northern Indochina.
The chestnut-bellied rock thrush was formally described in 1832 by the Irish zoologist Nicholas Vigors under the binomial name Turdus erythogaster. The identical name had been used for a different species by the Dutch naturalist Pieter Boddaert in 1783. The chestnut-bellied rock thrush was described again in 1833 by the English naturalists William Jardine and Prideaux John Selby under... Wikipedia →
| # | Park | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Langtang National Park | 🇳🇵 Nepal | |
| 2 | Royal Manas National Park | 🇧🇹 Bhutan | |
| 3 | Doi Inthanon National Park | 🇹🇭 Thailand | |
| 4 | Manas National Park | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 5 | Namdapha National Park | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 6 | Jim Corbett National Park | 🇮🇳 India |
With luck
About 10% of wildlife watchers report a Chestnut-bellied Rock-Thrush sighting in Royal Manas National Park on a given day, based on 125 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data from 2019 to 2026. It is the 139th most-seen of the 388 birds we can rate there. Over three days the chance rises to about 30%, and over a week to about 50%, if each day is a fresh chance.
February
In that month about 30% of wildlife watchers report a Chestnut-bellied Rock-Thrush in Royal Manas National Park on a given day, against under 5% in April–May and October, the lowest months. That is one of Royal Manas National Park's driest months, with about 65 mm of rain against 930 mm in July. August and September have too few records to rate.
Between 8 and 11 am
Across all the parks we cover, that three-hour window holds the most Chestnut-bellied Rock-Thrush sightings with a recorded time, and about 9 in 10 of them come between 6 am and 6 pm: it is a daytime animal.
Among the best
Of the 6 parks where we can rate Chestnut-bellied Rock-Thrush sightings, Royal Manas National Park ranks 2nd at about 10%, level with the leaders once rounded. The best odds are in Langtang National Park (Nepal, about 10%).
Same genus: Monticola
The closest relatives of the Chestnut-bellied Rock-Thrush that you can see in Royal Manas National Park (genus Monticola, Rock-Thrushes) are Blue-capped Rock-Thrush (about 30%) and Blue Rock-Thrush (about 10%), with each one's daily chance of a sighting.
GBIF citizen-science records
It is estimated from how often the Chestnut-bellied Rock-Thrush is recorded against all the birds logged in Royal Manas National Park (125 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.
