Sometimes called Asian Azure-winged Magpie, this is the smaller, darker Japanese race C. c. japonica.
A flock of these spectacular corvids foraged warily in the canopy of a wooded section of the park. They have a
patchy distribution in East Asia and these were the only ones I saw on our recent visit. Formerly considered conspecific
with the Iberian Magpie (C. cooki) of Spain and Portugal, they are now usually split into two separate species
based on molecular research by Fok et al. (2002) and Kryukov et al. (2004). This split is recognized by Clements/eBird,
IOC and HBW, but H&M4 prefer a more traditional biological species approach retaining them as a single species.
Canon PowerShot SX50 HS.References:
Boesman, P. (2016). Notes on the vocalizations of Iberian Azure-winged Magpie (Cyanopica cooki) and Asian Azure-winged Magpie (Cyanopica cyanus). HBW Alive Ornithological Note 204. In: Handbook of the Birds of the World Alive. Lynx Edicions, Barcelona. (retrieved from http://www.hbw.com/node/932151 on 9 June 2017).
Fok, K.W., Wade, C.M. & Parkin, D.T. (2002) Inferring the phylogeny of disjunct populations of the azure-winged magpie Cyanopica cyanus from mitochondrial control region sequences. Proc. Roy. Soc. London (Ser. B Biol. Sci.) 269: 1671–1679.
Kryukov, A., Iwasa, M.A., Kakizawa, R., Suzuki, H., Pinsker, W. & Haring, E. (2004) Synchronic east–west divergence in azure-winged magpies (Cyanopica cyanus) and magpies (Pica pica). J. Zool. Syst. Evol. Res. 42(4): 342–351.
Madge, S. (2017). Asian Azure-winged Magpie (Cyanopica cyanus). In: del Hoyo, J., Elliott, A., Sargatal, J., Christie, D.A. & de Juana, E. (eds.). Handbook of the Birds of the World Alive. Lynx Edicions, Barcelona. (retrieved from http://www.hbw.com/node/60742 on 9 June 2017).
Madge, S. & Burn, H. (1994) Crows and Jays: A Guide to the Crows, Jays and Magpies of the World. Houghton Mifflin, Boston.