Identification
Slightly larger than a sparrow. Sexes alike, except that the male has red irides while those of the female are pale buff.
Behavior
It is confined to elevations above 3,000 feet, but is common in suitable country above this height. It loves nillu(Strobilanthes) and elephant grass (dwarf bamboo), and may be confindently expected where these plants from dense brakes of undergrowth in the damp hil forests. It lives usually in pairs and some times it might easily be mistaken for a mouse. It feeds on small insects, being partial to soft-bodied green crickets (Tettigoniidae), which it finds hiding on the undersides of leaves.
The nest is large for the size of the bird, and it composed of moss, grass, scrub-bamboo leaves, etc., with a fairly deep cup lined with fine fibers. The breeding season is February to May, with a secondary season in September. The two eggs, which are fragile, are described as 'oval and only slightly pointed at the small end. The colour... whitish-pink, thickly powered all over with rather deeper purplish markings and with one or two long hair-lines at deep barown the larger end. Size .9 by .67' (about 22.6 X 16.7 mm.)
This mouse-coloured bird is essentially an inhabitant of the dense undergrowth of the mountain forests, or of thick scrub; but occasionally it will venture into tea-fields where these adjoin forest.
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