The Lesser Goldenback

I have seen this bird (Lesser Goldenback) virtually all over the country where ever I have gone expect when I recently went to Sikkim for birding and I saw the Greater Goldenback there. A beautiful bird with the Golden back that justifies its name. This bird is a common one and often seen in and near the city parks, trees and plantations. Today we saw the birds in what seemed a pre-mating ritual (breeding season being Feb to Jul). The birds were seemed to be chasing each other and two places that I saw them today there were three in the group. How they were interacting with each other was great observing. One surprising thing was that in this group of three two were males and one female... Ummm...

A very very common pose of this beautiful bird: Lesser Goldenback

One bird used to fly off to a branch and the other two used to follow. One of the birds, generally the one that had flown to the branch used to peck it like woodpeckers do and then another one of the three used to fly off to the next branch - a different one, with other two following. This was repeated three times over that I witnessed. 

The birds have two subspecies seen with one having white underparts (Central Indian Plains) and the another sub species have pale yellow underparts (North Western Indian subcontinent). 

Same bird as above - the one that took the lead this time over in flying to this branch and pecking.

Though I have observed these birds nesting always in nest excavated in the trees but it has been reported that they have been noted nesting in Mud Embankments too.