Yellow-breasted Bunting

Yellow-breasted Bunting is a small songbird with two subspecies.

Yellow-breasted Buntings often move alone or in pairs during the breeding season, but prefer to gather in groups during the non-breeding season, especially during migration and winter, when they gather in large groups of hundreds to thousands, up to 3,500-7,000. They move and forage on the ground, on grass stems or shrub branches during the day, and roost in the grass at night. They are timid and fly away when they see people.

The call of the Yellow-breasted Bunting is low and weak, like "ti-ti" or "di-di". During the breeding period, the male bird stands on the top branches of young trees, shrubs or grass stems and sings loudly, with varied and pleasant calls.

It varies with the season. During the breeding season, the Yellow-breasted Bunting mainly feeds on insects and insect larvae, and also eats some small invertebrates and plant foods such as grass seeds, seeds and fruits. The insects eaten mainly include beetles, ants, insects and insect larvae such as Coleoptera, Lepidoptera, Orthoptera, Diptera, Homoptera and Pyralidae. During the migration period, it mainly feeds on crops such as millet, rice, sorghum, and wheat grains, and also eats some grass seeds and plant fruits and seeds.

Yellow-breasted Bunting breeds in Northeast China and Siberia, Russia, and winters in the southeast coast of China, South Asia and Southeast Asia. It passes through most parts of my country during its migration in spring and autumn every year.

The breeding season of Yellow-breasted Bunting is from May to July. In late April and early May, male birds can be heard standing on the tops of grass stems and shrubs, singing for a long time and courting, with clear and melodious voices. The nests are mostly built in grasslands, swamps, and shallow pits under shrubs and grass on the ground on the banks of rivers and lakes. They are hidden by the surrounding grass and shrubs and are generally difficult to find. The nest is bowl-shaped, with the outer layer made of dead grass leaves and grass stems, and the inner layer made of thinner dead grass stems and grass leaves, and padded with cow hair, pig hair, horse tail and animal hair. One nest is bred per year, with 3-6 eggs per nest, usually 4-5 eggs. The eggs are green-gray with gray-brown or brown spots, and are oval. The male and female birds share the responsibility of incubating the eggs, and the incubation period is 13±1 days. The chicks are late-maturing, and the male and female parents raise them together, and the nesting period is 13-14 days.

In China, the yellow-breasted bunting occupies a large share in the bird trade. The forms in which this species enters the trade market in southern and northern China are also very different. In northern China, this species enters the trade market as a pet, and is popular because of its beautiful appearance and pleasant voice of the male; in southern China, this species enters the market as a food. Because traditional Chinese medicine theory believes that this species has a nourishing and strengthening effect, people in Guangdong have derived traditional Chinese medicine theory and mistakenly promoted that eating soup made with the bunting as the main ingredient can nourish the kidneys and strengthen yang, greatly improving men's sexual ability. Although this statement has not been supported by modern pharmacological experiments, this tradition is still widely spread with the spread of Cantonese cuisine and Guangdong food culture. Since artificial breeding has never been achieved, the individuals required are all caught in the wild. This food culture has brought disaster to the yellow-breasted bunting and caused a sharp decline in the population of wild yellow-breasted buntings.

Listed in the "Red List of Endangered Species of the World Conservation Union" (IUCN) ver3.1: Critically Endangered (CR) 

Listed in the "List of Terrestrial Wildlife with Important Economic and Scientific Research Value under State Protection" (Item 684) issued by the State Forestry Administration of China on August 1, 2000.  

Listed in China's "National Key Protected Wildlife List" (February 5, 2021) Level 1.

Protect wildlife and eliminate game.

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Origin: Bangladesh, Cambodia, China, Finland, India, Japan, Kazakhstan, South Korea, North Korea, Lao People's Democratic Republic, Malaysia, Mongolia, Myanmar, Nepal, Oman, Pakistan, Russian Federation, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam.
Migrant birds: Bahrain, Belarus, Belgium, Brunei, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Egypt, Estonia, France, Germany, Greece, Islamic Republic of Iran, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Jordan, Latvia, Malta, Netherlands, Norway, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Saudi Arabia, Spain, Sweden, Syrian Arab Republic, Turkey, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, United States.
In China, it is distributed throughout the eastern region of China, including the provinces and regions of Northeast, North China, Central China, East China, and some provinces and regions of Northwest China. This species can be seen in transit during the migration season, and can also be seen in the provinces of Southwest and South China during the wintering season. Its distribution in Chin

The yellow-breasted bunting is a small bird. The male's forehead, head, chin, and throat are black, and the head and upper body are chestnut or chestnut red; the tail is dark brown, and the two outer pairs of tail feathers have long wedge-shaped white spots; the two wings are dark brown, and there are A narrow white transverse band and a broad white wing patch. The lower body is bright yellow and there is a dark maroon horizontal band on the chest.
The upper body of the female bird is brown or yellowish brown, with a thick dark brown central vertical stripe, the waist and tail coverts are chestnut red, the wings and tail are dark brown, the middle coverts have broad white end spots, and the large coverts have narrow The gray-brown end spots also form two light wing spots, and the eyebrow skin is yellowish white. The lower body is light yellow, there is no horizontal band on the chest, and the two flanks have chestnut brown vertical stripes.
The top stripe of female and sub-a