Indian Golden Oriole
Oriolus kundoo
A flash of gold and black through the canopy.
Seen atHaldwani
Opens recordings on xeno-canto, the open bird-sound archive.
What the hills call it
Peelak
/ pee·lak /पीलक
Indian Golden Oriole — A flash of gold and black through the canopy.
Field notes
- Order
- Passeriformes
- Family
- Oriolidae · Orioles
- Genus
- Oriolus
- Length
- 24–25 cm
- Weight
- 60–100 g
- At Kunja
- Summer visitor — through the warm months
- Conservation
- Least Concern
How to know it
The male is brilliant golden-yellow with black wings and a black eye-stripe; the female and young are duller, greener-yellow. A flash of gold in the canopy.
What it eats
Fruit, berries and nectar with insects and caterpillars, taken high in the trees.
Where & when to spot it
In the tall leafy trees, more often heard — a rich, fluty 'pee-lo-lo' — than glimpsed as it slips through the canopy.
Nesting & mating
A neat hammock-cup slung in a high horizontal fork; two to four eggs in the warm months.
In the lens
Indian Golden Oriole, photographed at Haldwani
Photographs by Manohar Negi · mnegi.com — tap any photo to view it full
More to spot
PasseridaeHouse Sparrow
Passer domesticus
Kunja
MuscicapidaeBlue Whistling Thrush
Myophonus caeruleus
Kunja
SturnidaeCommon Myna
Acridotheres tristis
Kunja
HirundinidaeRed-rumped Swallow
Cecropis daurica
Kunja
PycnonotidaeHimalayan Bulbul
Pycnonotus leucogenys
Kunja
MegalaimidaeGreat Barbet
Psilopogon virens
Kunja