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Indian White-eye Mobbing Calls Revealed 12 Bird Species Missed by Transects

Two Indian white-eyes perched on branches at Ganeshgudi, India
Research · Ecology

Playback of Indian white-eye (Zosterops palpebrosus) mobbing calls revealed 12 bird species that conventional line transects missed in a forest survey in Yunnan, China. The study, published in 2026, found that the two methods detected different parts of the bird community.

A transect is a predefined line or route used to survey an area systematically, with observations, signs or sampling points recorded along it.

Researchers carried out 23 repeat surveys at Haikou Forest Farm near Kunming from November 2023 to November 2024. The routes crossed evergreen broad-leaved forest, coniferous forest and shrub habitats on the central Yunnan Plateau. Line transects recorded all birds seen or heard along the route, while the playback method counted birds that approached and responded to recordings made when Indian white-eyes mobbed small owls.

The two survey methods detected different species

Line transects recorded 84 species compared with 51 using mobbing-call playback, with 39 species detected by both methods. This meant that 12 species were found only by playback even though transects detected more species overall. Across the replicate surveys, combining the two approaches increased species detection rate by as much as 46.9%. Transects were more effective for birds weighing at least 15 g. Playback, however, was more efficient for small-bodied birds, especially those weighing 0–10 g, and for insectivorous and nectar-feeding species.

Method differences changed through the year

Detection differences also changed with season. The two methods differed significantly during the non-breeding season, while no clear difference was found during the breeding season. Body mass was the strongest factor separating responses to the two survey methods, followed by habitat type and feeding niche. Phylogenetic relatedness contributed little to whether species responded to the white-eye calls.

Sources and image credit

  1. Liu, Y., Shen, Z., & Lei, F. (2026). Comparing line transect and Indian White-eye mobbing call playback for detecting forest birds in subtropical Yunnan. Avian Research, 17(2), 100362. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.avrs.2026.100362

Image: Drashokk / Wikimedia Commons — two wild Indian white-eyes perched together at Ganeshgudi, Karnataka, India, 18 December 2024; representative social image, not birds from the Yunnan study; cropped to 16:9 · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Source

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