Arabian Tropicbird, one of the rarest seabirds in the State, has been sighted off the Kollam coast during a pelagic survey jointly undertaken by the Forest Department and Thiruvananthapuram-based Travancore Nature History Society (TNHS).
Figuring in the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List of Threatened Species, the subspecies is generally found in the Persian Gulf, Gulf of Aden, Red Sea, Pakistan, western India, south-western Sri Lanka and the Horn of Africa. It is also a rare but regular vagrant to Seychelles Island.
While it had earlier been considered a subspecies of the Red-billed Tropicbird ( Phaethon aethereus aethereus) of Central Atlantic Ocean which breeds on islands south of the equator, the Arabian Tropicbird ( Phaethon aethereus indicus) is distinguished by its smaller size, orange bill with black cutting edge and the shape of eye-line.
