• Summary
• Text account
• Data table and detailed info
• Distribution map
• Reference and further resources

Taxonomic note
The two closely related Sundaic species previously known as Black Laughingthrush Garrulax lugubris and Bare-headed Laughingthrush G. calvus (del Hoyo and Collar 2016), often formerly treated as conspecific, were subject to molecular analysis for the first time by Cai et al. (2019), who discovered that they actually belong in another babbler family, proving to be closer to the genus Pomatorhinus than Pomatorhinus is to Erythrogenys. Monotypic.

Taxonomic source(s)
Handbook of the Birds of the World and BirdLife International. 2021. Handbook of the Birds of the World and BirdLife International digital checklist of the birds of the world. Version 6. Available at: https://datazone.birdlife.org/userfiles/file/Species/Taxonomy/HBW-BirdLife_Checklist_v6_Dec21.zip.

Red List criteria met

Critically Endangered	Endangered	Vulnerable
-	-	-

Red List history

Year	Category	Criteria
2024	Least Concern
2016	Least Concern
2012	Least Concern
2009	Least Concern
2008	Least Concern
2004	Least Concern
2000	Lower Risk/Least Concern
1994	Lower Risk/Least Concern
1988	Lower Risk/Least Concern

Migratory status	not a migrant	Forest dependency	medium
Land-mass type		Average mass	-

	Estimate	Data quality
Extent of Occurrence (breeding/resident)	451,000 km2
Severely fragmented?	no	-

	Estimate	Data quality	Derivation	Year of estimate
Population size	unknown	-	-	-
Population trend	decreasing	-	suspected	-
Generation length	4.32 years	-	-	-

Population justification: The global population size has not been quantified, but the species is described as generally uncommon although common at Bukit Fraser in Malaysia (del Hoyo et al. 2007). This species is considered to have a medium dependency on forest habitat, and tree cover is estimated to have declined by 6.8% within its mapped range over the past three generations (Global Forest Watch 2022, using Hansen et al. [2013] data and methods disclosed therein). Therefore, as a precautionary measure, it is tentatively suspected that this loss of cover may have led to a decline of between 1-19% in the species' population size over the same time frame.

Trend justification:   .

Country/Territory	Presence	Origin	Resident	Breeding visitor	Non-breeding visitor	Passage migrant
Indonesia	extant	native	yes
Malaysia	extant	native	yes
Thailand	extant	native	yes

Country/Territory	IBA Name
Indonesia	Kerinci Seblat
Malaysia	Baleh headwaters
Malaysia	Bintang Range
Malaysia	Central Titiwangsa Range
Malaysia	Crocker Range
Malaysia	Danum-Linau
Malaysia	Dulit Range
Malaysia	Kelabit Highlands
Malaysia	Krau Wildlife Reserve
Malaysia	Maliau Basin Conservation Area
Malaysia	Mount Kinabalu
Malaysia	Mulu - Buda Protected Area
Malaysia	Selangor Heritage Park
Malaysia	Trus Madi Range
Malaysia	Usun Apau plateau

Habitat (level 1)	Habitat (level 2)	Importance	Occurrence
Forest	Subtropical/Tropical Moist Lowland	major	resident
Forest	Subtropical/Tropical Moist Montane	major	resident
Altitude		Occasional altitudinal limits

Purpose	Scale
Pets/display animals, horticulture	international

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Recommended citation
BirdLife International (2024) Species factsheet: Black Babbler Melanocichla lugubris. Downloaded from https://datazone.birdlife.org/species/factsheet/black-babbler-melanocichla-lugubris on 22/11/2024.
Recommended citation for factsheets for more than one species: BirdLife International (2024) IUCN Red List for birds. Downloaded from https://datazone.birdlife.org/species/search on 22/11/2024.