''Elaenia'' is a genus of

passerine A passerine () is any bird of the order Passeriformes (; from Latin 'sparrow' and '-shaped'), which includes more than half of all bird species. Sometimes known as perching birds, passerines are distinguished from other orders of birds by t ...

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 ...

s in the tyrant flycatcher family which occur in

Mexico Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatema ...

, the

Caribbean The Caribbean (, ) ( es, El Caribe; french: la Caraïbe; ht, Karayib; nl, De Caraïben) is a region of the Americas that consists of the Caribbean Sea, its islands (some surrounded by the Caribbean Sea and some bordering both the Caribbean Se ...

, and

Central Central is an adjective usually referring to being in the center of some place or (mathematical) object. Central may also refer to: Directions and generalised locations * Central Africa, a region in the centre of Africa continent, also known as ...

and

South America South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere at the northern tip of the continent. It can also be described as the southe ...

. Except by voice, specific identification is often difficult since many species are very similar. They are also known by the common name elaenia, which they share with the similar tyrant flycatchers of the genus '' Myiopagis''. ''Elaenia'' flycatchers are typically brownish, greyish or olive above, and off-white and/or pale yellow on the belly, with a white or pale yellowish eye-ring of variable strength and two or three wing bars. Some species show a crest; often with a semi-concealed white patch/streak.

Taxonomy

The genus ''Elaenia'' was introduced by the Swedish zoologist Carl Jakob Sundevall in 1836. The

type species In zoological nomenclature, a type species (''species typica'') is the species name with which the name of a genus or subgenus is considered to be permanently taxonomically associated, i.e., the species that contains the biological type specimen ...

was subsequently designated as the

yellow-bellied elaenia The yellow-bellied elaenia (''Elaenia flavogaster'') is a small bird of the tyrant flycatcher family. It breeds from southern Mexico and the Yucatán Peninsula through Central and South America as far as northern Argentina, and on Trinidad and To ...

. The name of the genus 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 ...

ελαινεος ''elaineos'' "of olive-oil" or "oleaginous". The genus contains 22 species:

References

*Hilty, Steven L. (2003): ''Birds of Venezuela''. Christopher Helm, London. *Stiles, F. Gary & Skutch, Alexander Frank (1989): ''A guide to the birds of Costa Rica''. Comistock, Ithaca. Bird genera Higher-level bird taxa restricted to the Neotropics {{Tyrannidae-stub

Taxonomy

See also

References