munia

plural munias · alternative minia

1. Any of certain estrildid finches of the genera Lonchura (most instances) and Amandava (two species).

   Munias are smaller than sparrows; they have pointed short tails, and live in flocks, building large communal nests shared by several breeding pairs.

   2000, Tara Gandhi, Birds and Plant Regeneration, page 76

   2 more examples

   It is said, however, occasionally though rarely to eat insects, and Layard has related how an individual, kept in captivity, killed and swallowed small birds (Munias), its fellow-captives.

   1895, Eugene William Oates, William Thomas Blanford, Birds, volume 3, page 88

   Okanoya (2002) argues that the Bengalese finch has a much more 'complex' song than the munia. As mentioned earlier, his measure of complexity is the song linearity. He finds that the average song linearity of the munia is around 0.8 while the Bengalese finch song has a value of around 0.4.

   2010, Graham R. S. Ritchie, Simon Kirby, “20: A Possible Role for Selective Masking in the Evolution of Complex, Learned Communication Systems”, in Caroline Lyon, Chrystopher L. Nehaniv, Angelo Cangelosi, editors, Emergence of Communication and Language, page 398

   Synonyms: mannikin, silverbill, avadavat