Old World SparrowsScaly-breasted MuniaLonchura punctulata
- ORDER: Passeriformes
- FAMILY: Estrildidae
Basic Description
The Scaly-breasted Munia is a tiny songbird with an oversized bill—a perfect combination for clambering up and feasting on seeding grasses. Adults combine chocolate brown upperparts with intricately scalloped white underparts. Plainer buff-and-brown juveniles are very similar to other juvenile munias. Scaly-breasted Munias are social birds, foraging in grassy open areas in small groups, frequently nesting colonially, and gathering in noisy, twittering flocks outside the breeding season. This diminutive species is native to southeastern Asia and has been widely introduced around the world including Southern California and the Gulf of Mexico coast.
More ID InfoOther Names
- Capuchino Punteado (Spanish)
- Capucin damier (French)
- Cool Facts
- Scaly-breasted Munias are known by several different names, including Spotted Munia, Nutmeg Mannikin, and Spice Finch.
- Some Scaly-breasted Munias get a little carried away during the nest-building process. These small, chickadee-sized birds sometimes add hundreds of grass blades and more than 1,000 grass heads to the nest, resulting in a huge structure the size of a watermelon.