A forest-dwelling partridge with conspicuous white cheeks, it lives in dense evergreen forest and uses the forest floor and grassy edges.
Its white cheeks and dark throat are key features of the face.
White-cheeked Partridges occur on leaf-littered forest floors beneath a largely closed canopy. In the Garo Hills of north-eastern India, they also inhabit community-managed forests around national parks.
Surveys in summer 2022 and winter 2023 followed existing trails through village reserves, community forests and other forest sites. One bird flushed from the ground at Daribok near Nokrek National Park on 28 May 2022. Three flushed from the ground in Baghmara’s Karwani section on 9 January 2023.
Calls were also heard at Baladinggre, Halwa Ambeng and other forest locations. Together, visual and auditory records documented this partridge in forests across the landscape surrounding the national parks.
An extinction-risk assessment has not been added yet.
The 2024 report identifies community-managed forests as refuges for birds outside protected areas. It calls for systematic studies of distribution and abundance across forest types, including the effects of clearing forest for cultivation and housing.