{"id":54965,"date":"2023-05-09T18:00:16","date_gmt":"2023-05-09T09:00:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/environment\/2023\/may\/09\/bird-with-an-elvis-like-quiff-that-cant-stop-mimicking-india-aoe"},"modified":"2023-05-09T18:00:16","modified_gmt":"2023-05-09T09:00:16","slug":"great-pretender-the-bird-with-an-elvis-like-quiff-that-cant-stop-mimicking","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/?p=54965","title":{"rendered":"Great pretender: the bird with an Elvis-like quiff that can\u2019t stop mimicking"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Scientists are learning the secrets of the greater racket-tailed drongo and other creatures in a jungle in south India from the people who have always lived there<\/p>\n<p>In the dense forests of south India\u2019s Western Ghats, you may be lucky enough to spot a greater racket-tailed drongo crooning to birds of other species nearby. But the drongo is not singing. It is mimicking the other birds, according to ethno-ornithologist Samira Agnihotri.<\/p>\n<p>With recording equipment in hand, trekking up to six miles (10km) a day through the forests, Agnihotri has been taping native birdsong for the past 18 years. Her favourite is this drongo, a bluish-black bird with an Elvis-like quiff and two very elongated tail feathers.<\/p>\n<p> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/environment\/2023\/may\/09\/bird-with-an-elvis-like-quiff-that-cant-stop-mimicking-india-aoe\">Continue reading&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Scientists are learning the secrets of the greater racket-tailed drongo and other creatures in a jungle in south India from the people who have always lived thereIn the dense forests of south India\u2019s Western Ghats, you may be lucky enough to spot a gre&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2275,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"sns_share_botton_hide":"","vkExUnit_sns_title":"","_vk_print_noindex":"","sitemap_hide":"","_veu_custom_css":"","veu_display_promotion_alert":"","vkexunit_cta_each_option":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[265,337,456,1216,65,59,62,503,61,485,94,42],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-54965","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-animals","category-birds","category-conservation","category-conservation-and-indigenous-people","category-environment","category-global-development","category-india","category-indigenous-peoples","category-south-and-central-asia","category-trees-and-forests","category-wildlife","category-world-news"],"veu_head_title_object":{"title":"","add_site_title":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54965","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2275"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=54965"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54965\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":54966,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54965\/revisions\/54966"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=54965"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=54965"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=54965"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}