The white-crowned shama (Copsychus stricklandii) is a medium sized passerine bird in the Old World flycatcher family Muscicapidae. It is endemic to the Southeast Asian island of Borneo.[1] The Maratua shama was formerly treated as a subspecies.
It is closely related to the white-rumped shama (Copsychus malabaricus), and has in the past been sometimes considered a subspecies of that species.[2] The Maratua shama was formerly treated as a subspecies but is now treated as a separate species based on the differences in morphology and mitochondrial DNA sequences.[3] [4] The white-crowned shama is now monotypic: no subspecies are recognised.[3]
The specific name was bestowed in honour of Hugh Edwin Strickland[5]
The white-crowned shama is about 21cm–28cmcm (08inches–11inchescm) in length (including a 7cm (03inches) tail in adult males) and 31g42g in weight. Mainly blue-black upperparts contrast with orange-rufous underparts. It has a white rump and black throat. It is largely similar in appearance to the white-rumped shama subspecies C. m. suavis, which replaces it in southern and western Borneo, and hybridises with it where the ranges meet.[6] It differs in having a white, rather than black, crown. The distinctive Maratua form C. s. barbouri is about 20% longer than the nominate, and has an all-black tail, rather than white outer rectrices.[1]
White-crowned shamas are bred by local aviculturists in Borneo as cage-birds valued for their singing ability. They continue to be trapped as it is believed that wild-caught young birds are stronger, and better songsters, than those bred in captivity.[1]