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Updated India Index Estimated a 77% Long-term Increase for Tickell’s Blue Flycatcher

Tickell's blue flycatcher perched in vegetation in Dandeli, India
Conservation · Population & status

The 2025 interim update to State of India’s Birds, released on 6 May 2026, estimated a strong positive long-term change in the abundance index for Tickell’s blue flycatcher (Cyornis tickelliae) in India. The updated long-term estimate was +77%.

The current annual trend was also positive at +4.4% per year. Both updated numerical estimates clearly supported increases.

State of India’s Birds classifies Tickell’s blue flycatcher as a resident species associated with forest and plantation habitats and as endemic to the Indian Subcontinent. The updated analysis estimated its national distribution range at 1,030,771 km².

The species remains in the Low conservation-priority category under the assessment framework carried forward from the 2023 report. The numerical 2025 update adds newer trend estimates without by itself changing those carried-over conservation-priority labels.

The 2025 update used about 48 million eBird observations available through 31 May 2025, compared with 30 million in the 2023 assessment. The trend values describe change in a reporting-based abundance index rather than direct counts of individual birds.

Sources and image credit

  1. State of India’s Birds Partnership. (2026). State of India’s Birds: Range, trends, and conservation status – 2025 interim update (Version 2) [Data set]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.20036633

Image: Sai Adikarla — wild Tickell’s Blue Flycatcher photographed at Dandeli Wildlife Sanctuary, Karnataka, India, 18 May 2014; Wikimedia Commons / Flickr; representative species image; cropped to 16:9 · CC BY 2.0 · Source

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