A bird that dives from waterside perches to catch small fish. Its blue back contrasts with a chestnut belly.
The back and wings are blue and the belly is chestnut. Adult males have black bills; females have a reddish-brown lower bill.
Common kingfishers excavate horizontal burrows in earthen banks, enlarging the far end into an egg chamber. Both sexes dig. A previous year’s nest may be cleaned or excavated further and reused if it remains in good condition.
A study published in 2024 reported on 26 nest sites examined around Chiplun, Maharashtra, western India, during 2004–2023. Nests were in forests near settlements, in vertical earth cuttings beside roads, streams and other locations. Breeding in this population began in June with the southwest monsoon.
To begin digging, the birds alternately flew from nearby perches and struck the chosen spot with their bills. Once the entrance extended about five to six centimetres inward, they perched at its edge and continued excavating. Measured tunnels ranged from twenty to fifty-five centimetres long. If they encountered stones, roots or impenetrably hard soil, they abandoned that site, selected another location and started again.
An extinction-risk assessment has not been added yet.
Retaining excavatable earth banks helps conserve kingfisher nesting habitat. The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism’s June 2025 explanatory material for the Kakehashi River basin identifies kingfishers nesting in banks along the meandering 8–9 km reach. It designates this reach for conservation and sets out a policy to conserve or create waterside nesting banks alongside reedbeds, gravel bars and fish-spawning habitat.