A bizarre-looking bulbul with a bald head has been discovered in Laos by a team of scientists from the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) and the University of Melbourne. The Bare-faced Bulbul Pycnonotus hualon is the first new species of Asian bulbul to be discovered in over a hundred years.

The Bare-faced Bulbul inhabits a remote area of rugged limestone karsts around 250km south of the capital Vientiane and may also be present in similar habitat over the border in northern-central Vietnam. It is a greenish-olive coloured bird with a paler breast, a bare pink face with blue orbital skin and a narrow Mohican of feathers running down the centre of the crown.

Contact Vietnam Birding at info@vietnambirding.com to arrange a trip to see the Bare-faced Bulbul and Sooty Babbler, a little-known Indochinese endemic, that shares the same habitat.