Blackstart Oenanthe melanura Scientific name definitions

14 cm; 13–18 g. Rather long-legged and slender chat. Nominate race is dull pale blue-tinged grey above , forehead and ear-coverts sometimes washed brownish, with darker wings and black alula, black rump to tail  ; paler greyish-white below , shading to white on belly to vent; bill and legs black. Sexes similar. Juvenile is browner, with pale fringes of wing feathers. Race <em>neumanni</em> is slightly darker grey above and below than nominate; lypura is pale sandy-grey above, tinged pale brownish below; <em>aussae</em> resembles previous, but darker and greyer ; airensis  is grey-brown above  , buffish-grey on throat, with cheeks to flanks sandy-brown, shading to cream; ultima is darkest, more brown than grey, variable.

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Editor's Note: Additional distribution information for this taxon can be found in the 'Subspecies' article above. In the future we will develop a range-wide distribution article.

Rocky hilly terrain , including dissected subdesert, stony desert with acacia and tamarisk, dry wadis, escarpments, ravines, screes, steep boulder-strewn hillsides, sandstone scarps and sandy dry riverbeds, also stone buildings including houses, huts and walls. Vegetation cover can be negligible, but usually includes sparse acacia and other thorny bushes and scattered shrubs; preference shown for thorny bushes in rocky ravines. Highest densities in Israel in well-vegetated wadis with acacia trees (desert oases) and within settlements.

Adult insects  (including beetles and ants) and caterpillars  reported in Middle East; also berries  , including Lycium shawii. Food apparently taken to nestlings consisted of caterpillars and winged insects. Forages in perch-and-pounce method, scanning from low perch and flying to ground to take prey; also gleans vegetation, and sallies after flying insects. Sometimes forms loose mixed flock various Sylvia warblers. After moving between perches, often slowly fans and flexes tail downwards while half-spreading wings. Not shy.

Song  , by male through most of year (infrequently in autumn), a series of short rapid variable warbling phrases mixing scratchy and whistled notes, “chi kuu chri-ki chiu-teuu” (lasting c. 1 second) or “chree chru chitchu chirri chiwi”, etc.; race neumanni places stress on first and last syllables in song phrase, whereas nominate unstressed, and songs of ultima and aussae detectably different. Subsong a protracted jumble of low warbling and wheezy notes. Calls include loud liquid “tyuu-trit” or “chura-lit” for contact, high whistled “fiifii” or “wiii” in alarm, and grating “skirrr” as chick-warning call.

Not globally threatened. Frequent to common. Density along two wadis found to be c. 1 pair/250 m. Common at Tibesti and S to Largeau, in Chad. Locally common in Sudan from Darfur E to Red Sea, and common in Danakil Desert; fairly common in Forêt du Day and Mabla Mts, in Djibouti. Common N of 7º N in Somalia. Very common resident in desert areas of Israel , with rough estimate of a few tens of thousands of pairs in 1980s; population apparently increasing with increase in cultivated fields, water sources and desert settlements  , with which species readily associates. Common along Rift Valley margins in Jordan. Common and widespread in C, W & S Arabian Peninsula. Although records in Nigeria and Gambia (outside known breeding range) interpreted as vagrancy, it is thought possible that they represent local populations at extremely low density.