Long-tailed Minivet

The long-tailed minivet is a slender canopy bird 17.5–20.5 cm long and around 18 g. Males have a glossy blue-black head and upper back, scarlet lower back and rump, and black wings marked with red, including a diagnostic red patch on the secondaries. Females replace the male's black and scarlet with grey and yellow. Both sexes have a proportionately long tail and an active, horizontal feeding posture (BirdForum species account).

It ranges from Afghanistan and the Himalayas across southern China to Myanmar, Laos, Thailand and Vietnam. Northern populations may move south in winter, while a named form occurs on Vietnam's Lang Biang Plateau. The species occupies open broadleaved and pine woodland and usually searches the canopy in pairs or parties. Beetles, flies, other insects, their larvae and spiders form the main diet. Both adults construct a small cup nest from grasses, fine twigs, rootlets and moss, binding and camouflaging it with cobwebs and lichen (BirdForum species account).