The black nunbird (''Monasa atra'') is a species of
near-passerine
Near passerines and higher land-bird assemblage are terms of traditional, pre-cladistic taxonomy that have often been given to tree-dwelling birds or those most often believed to be related to the true passerines (order Passeriformes) owing to mor ...
bird
Birds are a group of warm-blooded vertebrates constituting the class Aves (), characterised by feathers, toothless beaked jaws, the laying of hard-shelled eggs, a high metabolic rate, a four-chambered heart, and a strong yet lightweigh ...
in the family
Bucconidae
The puffbirds and their relatives in the near passerine family Bucconidae are tropical tree-dwelling insectivorous birds that are found from South America up to Mexico. Together with their closest relatives, the jacamars, they form a divergent ...
, the puffbirds, nunlets, and nunbirds. It is found in
Brazil
Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area ...
,
French Guiana
French Guiana ( or ; french: link=no, Guyane ; gcr, label=French Guianese Creole, Lagwiyann ) is an overseas departments and regions of France, overseas department/region and single territorial collectivity of France on the northern Atlantic ...
,
Guyana
Guyana ( or ), officially the Cooperative Republic of Guyana, is a country on the northern mainland of South America. Guyana is an indigenous word which means "Land of Many Waters". The capital city is Georgetown. Guyana is bordered by the ...
,
Suriname
Suriname (; srn, Sranankondre or ), officially the Republic of Suriname ( nl, Republiek Suriname , srn, Ripolik fu Sranan), is a country on the northeastern Atlantic coast of South America. It is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the north ...
, and
Venezuela
Venezuela (; ), officially the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela ( es, link=no, República Bolivariana de Venezuela), is a country on the northern coast of South America, consisting of a continental landmass and many islands and islets in th ...
.
[Remsen, J. V., Jr., J. I. Areta, E. Bonaccorso, S. Claramunt, A. Jaramillo, D. F. Lane, J. F. Pacheco, M. B. Robbins, F. G. Stiles, and K. J. Zimmer. Version 24 August 2021. Species Lists of Birds for South American Countries and Territories. https://www.museum.lsu.edu/~Remsen/SACCCountryLists.htm retrieved August 24, 2021]
Taxonomy and systematics
The black nunbird was described by the French polymath
Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon
Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon (; 7 September 1707 – 16 April 1788) was a French naturalist, mathematician, cosmologist, and encyclopédiste.
His works influenced the next two generations of naturalists, including two prominent ...
in 1780 in his ''Histoire Naturelle des Oiseaux'' from a specimen collected in
Cayenne,
French Guiana
French Guiana ( or ; french: link=no, Guyane ; gcr, label=French Guianese Creole, Lagwiyann ) is an overseas departments and regions of France, overseas department/region and single territorial collectivity of France on the northern Atlantic ...
. The bird was also illustrated in a hand-colored plate engraved by
François-Nicolas Martinet François-Nicolas Martinet (1731 - 1800) was a French engineer, engraver and naturalist.
Martinet engraved the plates for numerous works on natural history, especially ornithology. Notable in particular are those for ''l'Ornithologia, sive Synop ...
in the ''Planches Enluminées D'Histoire Naturelle'' that was produced under the supervision of
Edme-Louis Daubenton
Edme-Louis Daubenton (12 August 1730 – 12 December 1785) was a French naturalist.
Daubenton was the cousin of another French naturalist, Louis Jean-Marie Daubenton. Georges-Louis Leclerc, the Comte de Buffon engaged Edme-Louis Daubenton to su ...
to accompany Buffon's text. Neither the plate caption nor Buffon's description included a scientific name but in 1783 the Dutch naturalist
Pieter Boddaert
Pieter Boddaert (1730 – 6 May 1795) was a Dutch physician and natural history, naturalist.
Early life, family and education
Boddaert was the son of a Middelburg jurist and poet by the same name (1694–1760). The younger Pieter obtained his M.D ...
coined the
binomial name
In taxonomy, binomial nomenclature ("two-term naming system"), also called nomenclature ("two-name naming system") or binary nomenclature, is a formal system of naming species of living things by giving each a name composed of two parts, bot ...
''Calculus ater'' in his catalogue of the ''Planches Enluminées''. The black nunbird is now placed in the
genus
Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of extant taxon, living and fossil organisms as well as Virus classification#ICTV classification, viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus com ...
''
Monasa
''Monasa'' is a genus of puffbird in the Bucconidae family.
The genus was introduced by the French ornithologist Louis Vieillot in 1816 with the black nunbird (''Monasa atra'') as the type species. The generic name is from the Ancient Greek ''m ...
'' that was introduced by the French ornithologist
Louis Vieillot in 1816. The generic name is from the
Ancient Greek
Ancient Greek includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Dark Ages (), the Archaic peri ...
''monas'' meaning "solitary". The
specific epithet ''atra'' is from the Latin ''ater'' meaning "black".
The black nunbird is
monotypic
In biology, a monotypic taxon is a taxonomic group (taxon) that contains only one immediately subordinate taxon. A monotypic species is one that does not include subspecies or smaller, infraspecific taxa. In the case of genera, the term "unispec ...
.
[ Some authors treat it, the ]black-fronted nunbird
The black-fronted nunbird (''Monasa nigrifrons'') is a species of near-passerine bird in the family Bucconidae, the puffbirds, nunlets, and nunbirds. It is found in Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, and Peru.Remsen, J. V., Jr., J. I. Areta, ...
(''M. nigrifrons'') and the white-fronted nunbird
The white-fronted nunbird (''Monasa morphoeus'') is a species of near-passerine bird in the family Bucconidae, the puffbirds, nunlets, and nunbirds. It is found Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama, Peru, ...
(''M. morphoeus'') as a superspecies.[Rasmussen, P. C. and N. Collar (2020). Black Nunbird (''Monasa atra''), version 1.0. In Birds of the World (J. del Hoyo, A. Elliott, J. Sargatal, D. A. Christie, and E. de Juana, Editors). Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Ithaca, NY, USA. https://doi.org/10.2173/bow.blanun1.01 retrieved November 11, 2021]
Description
The black nunbird is long and weighs . The adult's upperparts are glossy blue-black and the underparts dark gray to light gray. The lesser coverts
A covert feather or tectrix on a bird is one of a set of feathers, called coverts (or ''tectrices''), which, as the name implies, cover other feathers. The coverts help to smooth airflow over the wings and tail. Ear coverts
The ear coverts are s ...
are white, showing as a wide white band on the closed wing. The bill is red, the eye red to brown, and the legs and feet slaty black. Immatures are sootier above and browner below than the adult.[
]
Distribution and habitat
The black nunbird is found from southern and eastern Venezuela through the Guianas
The Guianas, sometimes called by the Spanish loan-word ''Guayanas'' (''Las Guayanas''), is a region in north-eastern South America which includes the following three territories:
* French Guiana, an overseas department and region of France
* ...
into Brazil, where it occurs north of the Amazon River
The Amazon River (, ; es, Río Amazonas, pt, Rio Amazonas) in South America is the largest river by discharge volume of water in the world, and the disputed longest river system in the world in comparison to the Nile.
The headwaters of t ...
and east of the Rio Negro. It possibly also occurs in extreme eastern Colombia, though that has not been confirmed by the South American Classification Committee of the American Ornithological Society
The American Ornithological Society (AOS) is an ornithological organization based in the United States. The society was formed in October 2016 by the merger of the American Ornithologists' Union (AOU) and the Cooper Ornithological Society. Its m ...
(SACC).[ It inhabits humid '' terra firme'', ]gallery
Gallery or The Gallery may refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media
* Art gallery
** Contemporary art gallery
Music
* Gallery (band), an American soft rock band of the 1970s
Albums
* ''Gallery'' (Elaiza album), 2014 album
* ''Gallery'' (Gr ...
, and '' várzea'' forest, usually at the edges, near water, and in somewhat open landscapes. It can be seen at all levels of the forest from the understory to the canopy. In elevation it ranges from sea level to .[
]
Behavior
Feeding
The black nunbird hunts by sallies from a perch, usually plucking prey from vegetation or limbs though sometimes taking it in flight. Its diet includes insects, spiders, and other invertebrates as well as small vertebrates such as lizards. It follows army ant
The name army ant (or legionary ant or ''marabunta'') is applied to over 200 ant species in different lineages. Because of their aggressive predatory foraging groups, known as "raids", a huge number of ants forage simultaneously over a limi ...
swarms.[
]
Breeding
The black nunbird breeds between March and May in Venezuela and August to September in French Guiana. In the region of Manaus
Manaus () is the capital and largest city of the Brazilian state of Amazonas. It is the seventh-largest city in Brazil, with an estimated 2020 population of 2,219,580 distributed over a land area of about . Located at the east center of the s ...
, Brazil, it apparently nests twice each year. The nest is placed in a hole in level ground.[
]
Vocalization
The black nunbird's songs are a " ute-like 'whoo-doo-doo' and descending 'hyoo-hoo-hoo-oo-oo-oo'". Calls include a "loud 'yawkl-diddl' or 'quee-didada'".[
]
Status
The IUCN has assessed the black nunbird as being of Least Concern. It has a very large range, and though its population has not been enumerated it is believed to be stable.[ It is considered common in most of its range.][
]
References
External links
Black nunbird photo gallery
VIREO
{{Taxonbar, from=Q1264128
black nunbird
The black nunbird (''Monasa atra'') is a species of near-passerine bird in the family Bucconidae, the puffbirds, nunlets, and nunbirds. It is found in Brazil, French Guiana, Guyana, Suriname, and Venezuela.Remsen, J. V., Jr., J. I. Areta, E. ...
Birds of the Guianas
Birds of Venezuela
black nunbird
The black nunbird (''Monasa atra'') is a species of near-passerine bird in the family Bucconidae, the puffbirds, nunlets, and nunbirds. It is found in Brazil, French Guiana, Guyana, Suriname, and Venezuela.Remsen, J. V., Jr., J. I. Areta, E. ...
Taxonomy articles created by Polbot