L 12-13½ cm. Breeds in deciduous or mixed woods in mountains at lower and middle levels, often in copses along rivers. Summer visitor, wintering in Africa.
IDENTIFICATION: Intermediate between Pied and Collared, but with certain distinctions. On summer male, white on side of neck usually reaches farther back than on Pied (but a few are confusingly similar); look for prominent white tips to median wing-coverts (may merge with large white wing patch, though), more white on primary bases than on Pied (about as much as on 1st-summer a Collared), and extensive white on outer tailfeathers (sometimes visible from below on perched bird). Adult female very similar to female Collared, and often inseparable in the field; typically has white-tipped median coverts, but these may rarely be absent (and rarely there is a hint of such pale tips on Collared, too); white on primary bases somewhat less extensive on average (but some overlap).
VOICE: Contact/alarm-call a clear, straight piping note, ‘tüüp’, lowerpitched than in Collared, almost like Siberian Chiffchaff (ssp. tristis) at a distance. Sometimes a thinner, slightly shrill and rising ‘tüihp’. Contact-call also a quiet clicking ‘tec’. Song intermediate between Collared and Pied Flycatchers. Slower than Pied, more like Collared, but some rhythmic repetition of combination of notes as in Pied; has thin, shrill voice with many rolling notes, and keeps more even pitch than Collared, e.g. ‘sree sü-sü, sru-ti sru-ti sru-ti srrih si-vi sri’.
Order Song birds/Passeriformes, Family Flycatchers/Muscicapidae
Semi-collared Flycatcher/Ficedula semitorquata - Male
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