Neumann's warbler (''Hemitesia neumanni'') or Neumann's short-tailed warbler, is a species of bird in the family

Cettiidae Cettiidae is a newly validated family of small insectivorous songbirds ("warblers"), formerly placed in the Old World warbler "wastebin" assemblage. It contains the typical bush warblers (''Cettia'') and their relatives. As a common name, cetti ...

. It is found in

Democratic Republic of the Congo The Democratic Republic of the Congo (french: République démocratique du Congo (RDC), colloquially "La RDC" ), informally Congo-Kinshasa, DR Congo, the DRC, the DROC, or the Congo, and formerly and also colloquially Zaire, is a country in ...

, Rwanda, and

Uganda }), is a landlocked country in East Africa. The country is bordered to the east by Kenya, to the north by South Sudan, to the west by the Democratic Republic of the Congo, to the south-west by Rwanda, and to the south by Tanzania. The sou ...

. Its natural

habitat In ecology, the term habitat summarises the array of resources, physical and biotic factors that are present in an area, such as to support the survival and reproduction of a particular species. A species habitat can be seen as the physical ...

is subtropical or tropical moist

montane forest Montane ecosystems are found on the slopes of mountains. The alpine climate in these regions strongly affects the ecosystem because temperatures fall as elevation increases, causing the ecosystem to stratify. This stratification is a crucial ...

Taxonomy

Neumann's warbler was formally described in 1908 by the English zoologist Water Rothschild from specimens collected in a forested area west of Lake Tanganyika. He proposed the binomial name ''Sylvietta neumanni''. Neumann's warbler is now placed with the pale-footed bush warbler in the genus ''

Hemitesia ''Hemitesia'' is a genus of Old World warblers in the family Cettiidae, formerly classified in the family Sylviidae. The genus was erected by James Chapin in 1948. Taxonomy The genus ''Hemitesia'' was introduced in 1948 by the American ornitholo ...

'' that was introduced in 1948 by James Chaplin. The genus name combines 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 p ...

''hēmi-'' meaning "half-" or "small" with the genus '' Teslia'' that had been introduced by

Brian Hodgson Brian Hodgson (born 1938) is a British television composer and sound technician. Born in Liverpool in 1938, Hodgson joined the BBC Radiophonic Workshop in 1962 where he became the original sound effects creator for the science fiction program ...

in 1837. The specific epithet ''neumanni'' was chosen to honour the German ornithologist

Oscar Neumann Oscar Rudolph Neumann (3 September 1867 in Berlin – 17 May 1946 in Chicago) was a German ornithologist and naturalist who explored and collected specimens in Africa. He fled via Cuba and settled in the United States to escape Nazi persecutio ...

. The species 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 "unispe ...

: no subspecies are recognised. Neumann's warbler is the only species in the family

that is found in Africa.

Distribution and habitat

This warbler lives in thick undergrowth of montane forest, often near streams, in eastern

, southwest

, western Rwanda and western Burundi.

Description

Neumann's warbler is a small bird with an overall length of and a weight of . It has a large head with a distinctive striped pattern and a very short tail. The broad supercilium is grey-brown and present in front of the eye as a dull greenish and white pattern. The voice is a loud song ("tee-tiyoo-tee", "tee-tyer-tyii", "tyoowi-tyee", "tee-teeyoo-tyoowi" or "tay-tiyoo-tay") intermixing with almost inaudible lipsing notes, and is repeated at regular intervals.

References

Neumann's warbler Birds of Sub-Saharan Africa Neumann's warbler Neumann's warbler Taxonomy articles created by Polbot Taxobox binomials not recognized by IUCN {{Cettiidae-stub