The genus Eulabes contains the Grackles or Talking-Mynas, four of which are Indian species and well-known familiar cage-birds.
The Grackles chiefly frequent forests on hills, but are at times found in the plains. They feed entirely on fruit, never descending to the ground. Their natural notes are varied, and they are easily taught to repeat words and sounds. They live on the highest trees, laying their eggs in natural hollows of trees which are merely lined with a few leaves or a little grass. The eggs are generally only two in number, and they are a pale green or blue, spotted and splashed with purple and chocolate-brown.
In Eulabes the plumage is very glossy; the head is furnished with fleshy wattles, and there are frequently some bare patches of skin on the side of the head; the bill is thick, high, and curved, shorter than the head; the rictal bristles are weak; the feathers of the crown are very short and curled inwards, with a sort of parting down the middle of the crown; the wing is rather blunt, and the tail short and nearly square; the feet are strong.
All the Grackles are resident species or very locally migratory.
Key to the Species.
a. Some bare skin on sides of head.
a1. Two elongate bare patches of skin on the nape………………E. religiosa, p. 510.
b1. No bare patches of skin on the nape.
a2. Bare patch under eye joined to patch over ear-coverts………………E. intermedia, p. 511.
b2. Bare patch under eye not connected with patch over ear-coverts………………E. javanensis, p. 512.
b. No bare skin on sides of head………………E. ptilogenys, p. 513.