Black-rumped Flameback
Scientific Name: Dinopium benghalense
Category: bird
Brief Description
A striking woodpecker with a golden-yellow back, red crest, and heavily streaked underparts, commonly found clinging to tree trunks in wooded areas around Mumbai.
Characteristics
Medium-sized woodpecker (approx. 26-29 cm) featuring a bright golden-yellow back contrasting with a black rump and tail. It has a crimson red crest, whitish face with black markings (including a distinctive dark moustachial stripe), and heavily streaked or scaled underparts. The bill is dark and chisel-shaped.
Habitat
Deciduous and semi-evergreen forests, open woodlands, groves, urban parks, and gardens with mature trees, especially around lakes and urban green spaces in Powai.
When to Find It
Resident breeder throughout the year in Maharashtra; most active and vocal in the early mornings, particularly following the monsoon season in October.
Conservation Status
Least Concern
Ecological Role
Acts as a primary cavity excavator, creating nesting holes that are subsequently used by many other secondary cavity-nesting birds and mammals. It helps control wood-boring insect populations.
Easily Confused With
Greater Flameback (Chrysocolaptes guttacristatus), which is larger with a longer bill and has a fully black hindneck; Common Flameback can be distinguished by specific facial patterns and rump color.
Observation Tips
Look and listen for their characteristic rattling calls and loud drumming on dead or decaying branches in wooded parks and tree-lined avenues around Powai Lake.
Interesting Facts
Like other woodpeckers, they possess specialized stiff tail feathers to brace against tree trunks and an exceptionally long, barbed tongue coated in sticky saliva to extract insects from deep crevices.