Blue-and-white Flycatcher

Cyanoptila cyanomelana (Temminck, 1829)

≈16 cmLength22 gWeight

The conspicuous male has cobalt-blue upperparts, black from the face to the upper breast, and a white belly.

Busiest months: April · Most records: China, Japan, South Korea

Looks like Hainan Blue Flycatcher

Least Concern

How to identify

Field marks

Male has deep cobalt-blue upperparts
Male has black from the face to the upper breast and on the flanks, with the remaining underparts white
Male has conspicuous white patches at the bases of the outer tail feathers

Male, female and young

Male is deep blue; female has a mostly gray-brown head, face, and upperparts; immature male already has blue wings, but the rest is brown like the female.

Voice

A short, slightly melancholy series of whistles.

Similar species

Hainan Blue Flycatcher

Males are very similar; Blue-and-white Flycatcher has a sharp blue-white boundary on the breast and black claws, while Hainan Blue Flycatcher has an indistinct boundary and flesh-colored claws.

Where and when it's recorded

Blue-and-white Flycatcher has been recorded at 539 of the 8,171 birding hotspots we track, in 16 countries and regions.

Records by month Northern Hemisphere

Where it's recorded most

Nanhui DongtanChina858 records
Yeliu IBATaiwan (China)587 records
Po ToiHong Kong (China)341 records

More places

Eocheong-do (island)South Korea289 records
Matsu – Dongyin Vegetable FarmChina282 records
Kinabalu Park – HQ areaMalaysia265 records
Matsu – DongyinChina236 records
Sakata – Tobishima (island)Japan235 records
Wajima – Hegurajima (island)Japan210 records
Karuizawa – Karuizawa Wild Bird SanctuaryJapan191 records

Countries and regions with the most records

China Japan South Korea Malaysia Thailand Vietnam Singapore Cambodia

eBird records via GBIF up to 2024-12-31. A record means someone listed it; more records partly mean more birders, not more birds.

About

The blue-and-white flycatcher (Cyanoptila cyanomelana) is a migratory songbird in the Old World flycatcher family Muscicapidae. The species is also known as the Japanese flycatcher. It breeds in Japan, Korea, and in parts of north eastern China and the Russian Far East.

Excerpt from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0 · authors · Read more on Wikipedia

Questions

How big is the Blue-and-white Flycatcher?

The Blue-and-white Flycatcher is about ≈16 cm long and weighs around 22 g.

Where does the Blue-and-white Flycatcher live?

Its breeding range: Palearctic: Ussuriland (southeastern Russia), northeastern China, Korean Peninsula, southern Kuril Islands and Hokkaido to Kyushu (Japan). It is most often recorded in China, Japan and South Korea.