Purple Cochoa   Cochoa purpurea

Etymology

• Cochoa : Nepalese name Cocho
• Purpurea :  Latin word  purpureus – purple-coloured  , Greek word  porphura-  purple.

Vernacular name: Lepcha: Lo-nyum-pho, Nepal: Cocho

Distribution in India: Summer Visitor to Himalayas and North East Indian hills.

Description: Size 25–28 cm; Weight of 100–106 g.  The male is mainly deep greyish-purple, with silver-blue crown and black face. The primaries are with silvery-grey double patch and black intervening panel, black tips to all flight-feathers. The tail is lilac-grey with black terminal band. It has a relatively short bill, and legs are black. The female is patterned as male, but body rufous-brown above, brownish-orange below. The juvenile has basic female pattern on crown, wings and tail, but body is chocolate-brown with light rufous-buff flecking above, rufous-buff with heavy brown scaling below.

Habitat:  It is found in dense humid and moist broadleaf evergreen forest, pine forest, humid undergrowth in ravines, but mostly in lower canopy and middle storey. It is found from 1000–3000 m.

Food habits: It eats berries, insect and molluscs. It feeds on ground and in fruiting trees.

Breeding habits: They breed in May–Jul in India. The nest is a shallow cup placed above ground in fork of small tree. They lay a clutch of 2–4 eggs.