diff --git a/src/main/java/org/elasticsearch/action/bulk/BulkRequest.java b/src/main/java/org/elasticsearch/action/bulk/BulkRequest.java
index e02dbbec8e7..344a292adaf 100644
--- a/src/main/java/org/elasticsearch/action/bulk/BulkRequest.java
+++ b/src/main/java/org/elasticsearch/action/bulk/BulkRequest.java
@@ -98,13 +98,7 @@ public class BulkRequest extends ActionRequest<BulkRequest> {
      */
     public BulkRequest add(Iterable<ActionRequest> requests) {
         for (ActionRequest request : requests) {
-            if (request instanceof IndexRequest) {
-                add((IndexRequest) request);
-            } else if (request instanceof DeleteRequest) {
-                add((DeleteRequest) request);
-            } else {
-                throw new ElasticsearchIllegalArgumentException("No support for request [" + request + "]");
-            }
+            add(request);
         }
         return this;
     }
diff --git a/src/test/java/org/elasticsearch/action/bulk/BulkRequestTests.java b/src/test/java/org/elasticsearch/action/bulk/BulkRequestTests.java
index 9171fc4e424..d92610ab3eb 100644
--- a/src/test/java/org/elasticsearch/action/bulk/BulkRequestTests.java
+++ b/src/test/java/org/elasticsearch/action/bulk/BulkRequestTests.java
@@ -21,14 +21,19 @@ package org.elasticsearch.action.bulk;
 
 import com.google.common.base.Charsets;
 import org.apache.lucene.util.Constants;
+import org.elasticsearch.action.ActionRequest;
 import org.elasticsearch.action.delete.DeleteRequest;
 import org.elasticsearch.action.index.IndexRequest;
 import org.elasticsearch.action.update.UpdateRequest;
+import org.elasticsearch.client.Requests;
 import org.elasticsearch.common.Strings;
 import org.elasticsearch.common.bytes.BytesArray;
 import org.elasticsearch.test.ElasticsearchTestCase;
 import org.junit.Test;
 
+import java.util.ArrayList;
+import java.util.List;
+
 import static org.elasticsearch.common.io.Streams.copyToStringFromClasspath;
 import static org.hamcrest.Matchers.equalTo;
 import static org.hamcrest.Matchers.instanceOf;
@@ -98,4 +103,18 @@ public class BulkRequestTests extends ElasticsearchTestCase {
         bulkAction = copyToStringFromClasspath("/org/elasticsearch/action/bulk/simple-bulk5.json");
         new BulkRequest().add(new BytesArray(bulkAction.getBytes(Charsets.UTF_8)), true, "test", null, false);
     }
+
+    @Test
+    public void testBulkAddIterable() {
+        BulkRequest bulkRequest = Requests.bulkRequest();
+        List<ActionRequest> requests = new ArrayList<>();
+        requests.add(new IndexRequest("test", "test", "id").source("field", "value"));
+        requests.add(new UpdateRequest("test", "test", "id").doc("field", "value"));
+        requests.add(new DeleteRequest("test", "test", "id"));
+        bulkRequest.add(requests);
+        assertThat(bulkRequest.requests().size(), equalTo(3));
+        assertThat(bulkRequest.requests().get(0), instanceOf(IndexRequest.class));
+        assertThat(bulkRequest.requests().get(1), instanceOf(UpdateRequest.class));
+        assertThat(bulkRequest.requests().get(2), instanceOf(DeleteRequest.class));
+    }
 }