The green honeycreeper (''Chlorophanes spiza'') is a small
bird in the
tanager family. It is found in the tropical
New World from southern
Mexico south to
Brazil, and on
Trinidad. It is the only member of the
genus ''Chlorophanes''.
Taxonomy
The green honeycreeper was
formally described in 1758 by the Swedish naturalist
Carl Linnaeus in the
tenth edition of his ''
Systema Naturae
' (originally in Latin written ' with the ligature æ) is one of the major works of the Swedish botanist, zoologist and physician Carl Linnaeus (1707–1778) and introduced the Linnaean taxonomy. Although the system, now known as binomial nomen ...
'' under its current
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 ...
''Motacilla spiza''. He specified the
type locality
Type locality may refer to:
* Type locality (biology)
* Type locality (geology)
See also
* Local (disambiguation)
* Locality (disambiguation)
{{disambiguation ...
as
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 ...
. The specific epithet is the
Ancient Greek word for a common finch. Linnaeus based his description on the "green black-cap fly-catcher" that the English naturalist
George Edwards had described and illustrated in his 1743 book ''A Natural History of Uncommon Birds''. In 1853 the German naturalist
Ludwig Reichenbach
Heinrich Gottlieb Ludwig Reichenbach (8 January 1793 – 17 March 1879) was a German botanist and ornithologist. It was he who first requested Leopold Blaschka to make a set of glass marine invertebrate models for scientific education and museu ...
erected the genus ''Chlorophanes'' to accommodate the green honeycreeper. The name combines the Ancient Greek ''khlōros'' meaning green with ''-phanēs'' meaning showing. A comprehensive
molecular phylogenetic
Molecular phylogenetics () is the branch of phylogeny that analyzes genetic, hereditary molecular differences, predominantly in DNA sequences, to gain information on an organism's evolutionary relationships. From these analyses, it is possible to ...
study of the tanager family
Thraupidae published in 2014 found that the green honeycreeper and the
golden-collared honeycreeper
The golden-collared honeycreeper (''Iridophanes pulcherrimus'') is an uncommon species of Neotropical bird in the tanager family Thraupidae. It is the only member of the genus ''Iridophanes''.
It is found in Colombia, Ecuador, and Peru. Its natu ...
(''Iridophanes pulcherrimus'') were
sister species.
Seven
subspecies
In biological classification, subspecies is a rank below species, used for populations that live in different areas and vary in size, shape, or other physical characteristics (morphology), but that can successfully interbreed. Not all species ...
are recognised:
* ''C. s. guatemalensis''
Sclater, PL, 1861 – south Mexico to Honduras
* ''C. s. argutus''
Bangs & Barbour, 1922 – east Honduras to northwest Colombia
* ''C. s. exsul''
Berlepsch &
Taczanowski
Taczanowski (Polish feminine: Taczanowska; plural: Taczanowscy) is the surname of a Polish szlachta (nobility) family from Poznań bearing the Jastrzębiec coat of arms and the motto: ''Plus penser que dire''. They took their name from th ...
, 1884 – southwest Colombia and west Ecuador
* ''C. s. subtropicalis''
Todd, 1924 – north, central Colombia and west Venezuela
* ''C. s. spiza'' (Linnaeus, 1758) – Trinidad, east Colombia, Venezuela (except far west), the Guianas and north Brazil
* ''C. s. caerulescens''
Cassin, 1865 – south-central Colombia through east Ecuador and east Peru to central Bolivia and west Brazil
* ''C. s. axillaris''
Zimmer, JT, 1929 – east, southeast Brazil
The
purplish honeycreeper (''Chlorophanes purpurascens''), a
bird from Venezuela known only from the
type
Type may refer to:
Science and technology Computing
* Typing, producing text via a keyboard, typewriter, etc.
* Data type, collection of values used for computations.
* File type
* TYPE (DOS command), a command to display contents of a file.
* Ty ...
specimen, is now thought to be an
intergeneric hybrid between the green honeycreeper and either the
red-legged honeycreeper or the
blue dacnis
The blue dacnis or turquoise honeycreeper (''Dacnis cayana'') is a small passerine bird. This member of the tanager family is found from Nicaragua to Panama, on Trinidad, and in South America south to Bolivia and northern Argentina. It is widesp ...
.
Description
The green honeycreeper is long and weighs , averaging about . It has a long decurved bill. The male is mainly blue-tinged green with a black head and a mostly bright yellow bill. The female green honeycreeper is grass-green, paler on the throat, and lacks the male's iridescence and black head. Immatures are plumaged similar to females. The call is a sharp ''chip''.
Behavior
This is a forest canopy species. The female green honeycreeper builds a small cup nest in a tree, and incubates the clutch of two brown-blotched white eggs for 13 days. It is less heavily dependent on nectar than the other
honeycreeper
The typical honeycreepers form a genus ''Cyanerpes'' of small birds in the tanager family Thraupidae. They are found in the tropical New World from Mexico south to Brazil. They occur in the forest canopy, and, as the name implies, they are specia ...
s,
fruit and
seeds
being its main food (60%), with
nectar
Nectar is a sugar-rich liquid produced by plants in glands called nectaries or nectarines, either within the flowers with which it attracts pollinating animals, or by extrafloral nectaries, which provide a nutrient source to animal mutualists ...
(20%) and
insects (15%) as less important components of its diet.
References
Further reading
*
External links
Xeno-canto: audio recordings of the green honeycreeper
{{Taxonbar, from=Q1083101
green honeycreeper
Birds of Mexico
Birds of Belize
Birds of Costa Rica
Birds of Panama
Birds of the Guianas
Birds of the Amazon Basin
Birds of the Atlantic Forest
Birds of Venezuela
Birds of Colombia
Birds of Ecuador
Birds of Trinidad and Tobago
green honeycreeper
green honeycreeper
Birds of Brazil