Arnot's chat (''Myrmecocichla arnotti''), also known as the white-headed black-chat, is a species of

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 lightweig ...

in the chat and flycatcher family

Muscicapidae The Old World flycatchers are a large family, the Muscicapidae, of small passerine birds restricted to the Old World (Europe, Africa and Asia), with the exception of several vagrants and two species, Bluethroat (''Luscinia svecica)'' and Northe ...

. The species is found in southern Africa from Rwanda and Angola to South Africa.

Taxonomy

The species was described by

Henry Baker Tristram Henry Baker Tristram FRS (11 May 1822 – 8 March 1906) was an English clergyman, Bible scholar, traveller and ornithologist. As a parson-naturalist he was an early supporter of Darwinism, attempting to reconcile evolution and creation. Biogra ...

in 1869 based upon a specimen collected at

Victoria Falls Victoria Falls ( Lozi: ''Mosi-oa-Tunya'', "The Smoke That Thunders"; Tonga: ''Shungu Namutitima'', "Boiling Water") is a waterfall on the Zambezi River in southern Africa, which provides habitat for several unique species of plants and anim ...

in modern-day Zimbabwe, as ''Saxicola arnotti''. Tristram wrote that he named the species after the collector, a Mr. Arnott, but the man was actually named David Arnot. For this reason, it was suggested in 1965 that the name should be spelled ''arnoti'' instead. However, since there is no evidence in Tristram's original paper that the name was misspelled, the rules of the

International Code of Zoological Nomenclature The International Code of Zoological Nomenclature (ICZN) is a widely accepted convention in zoology that rules the formal scientific naming of organisms treated as animals. It is also informally known as the ICZN Code, for its publisher, the ...

mandate that the spelling ''arnotti'' be maintained. Along with the white-fronted black-chat this species is sometimes separated into the genus ''Pentholaea''. The species contains two subspecies, ''hartertii'', which is found in Angola, and the nominate, which is found across the rest of its range. A third subspecies, ''collaris'', is now usually considered a separate species, the Ruaha chat. This species is indistinguishable from Arnot's chat in male birds but has different plumage in females, a difference that has mostly been overlooked for over a century.

Habitat

Arnot's chat is most commonly found in healthy stands of

miombo The Miombo woodland is a tropical and subtropical grasslands, savannas, and shrublands biome (in the World Wide Fund for Nature scheme) located primarily in Central Africa. It includes four woodland savanna ecoregions (listed below) characterized b ...

and

mopane ''Colophospermum mopane'', commonly called mopane, mopani, balsam tree, butterfly tree, or turpentine tree, is a tree in the legume family (Fabaceae), that grows in hot, dry, low-lying areas, in elevation, in the far northern parts of southern A ...

woodland. It also occurs at lower densities in other kinds of open woodland with little herbaceous cover, and very rarely near buildings. It generally occurs from sea level to . The species is generally not migratory, but is presumed to undertake some localized wandering.

Description

Arnot's chat ranges in size from and weighs around . The plumage of the adults is

sexually dimorphic Sexual dimorphism is the condition where the sexes of the same animal and/or plant species exhibit different morphological characteristics, particularly characteristics not directly involved in reproduction. The condition occurs in most ani ...

; the male of the nominate race is overall black with a white crown and a white patch on the

wing 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 ...

. The female is similar but with a black crown and a white (tipped with black) throat and neck. The bill and legs are black. Juvenile birds are like the adults but with white feather tips on the crown or throat instead of fuller white. The male of the race ''harterti'' has less extensive white on the wings and a mostly black head with a small area of white on the forehead and above the eye; the white throat of the female is also less extensive than on the nominate.

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q2226177

Arnot's chat Arnot's chat (''Myrmecocichla arnotti''), also known as the white-headed black-chat, is a species of bird in the chat and flycatcher family Muscicapidae. The species is found in southern Africa from Rwanda and Angola to South Africa. Taxonomy Th ...

Birds of Southern Africa

Taxonomy articles created by Polbot