''Theristicus'' is a genus 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 ...

s in the family

Threskiornithidae The family Threskiornithidae includes 36 species of large wading birds. The family has been traditionally classified into two subfamilies, the ibises and the spoonbills; however recent genetic studies have cast doubt on this arrangement, and ha ...

. They are found in open, grassy habitats in

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 sout ...

. All have a long, decurved dark bill, relatively short reddish legs that do not extend beyond the tail in flight (unlike e.g. ''

Eudocimus ''Eudocimus'' is a genus of ibises, wading birds of the family Threskiornithidae. They occur in the warmer parts of the New World with representatives from the southern United States south through Central America, the West Indies, and South Amer ...

'' and ''

Plegadis ''Plegadis'' is a bird genus in the family Threskiornithidae. The genus name derives from Ancient Greek ''plegados'', "sickle", referring to the distinctive shape of the bill. Member species are found on every continent except Antarctica as well ...

''), and at least the back is grey.

Taxonomy

The genus ''Theristicus'' was erected by the German naturalist Johann Georg Wagler in 1832 with the black-faced ibis as 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 specime ...

. The 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 p ...

''theristikos'' meaning "of reaping". The genus contains four species.

References

* Matheu, E., & J. del Hoyo (1992). Family Threskiornithidae (Ibises and Spoonbills). pp. 472–506 in: del Hoyo, J., A. Elliott, & J. Sargatal (editors). ''Handbook of the Birds of the World.'' Vol. 1. Ostrich to Ducks. Lynx Edicions, Barcelona. Bird genera * Taxonomy articles created by Polbot {{Pelecaniformes-stub