Red-necked tanager

Red-necked tanager
Conservation status
Least Concern  (IUCN 3.1) [1]
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Aves
Order:	Passeriformes
Family:	Thraupidae
Genus:	Tangara
Species:	T. cyanocephala
Binomial name
Tangara cyanocephala (Müller, PLS, 1776)

The red-necked tanager (Tangara cyanocephala) is a species of bird in the family Thraupidae.

It is found in Brazil, Argentina, and Paraguay. Its natural habitats are subtropical or tropical moist lowland forest and heavily degraded former forest.

Taxonomy and systematics

The red-necked tanager was first described by Philipp Müller in 1776 as Tanagra cyanocephala. ^[2]

There are three recognised subspecies of the red-necked tanager:

• T. c. cearensis (Cory 1916) – differs from T. c. corallina "in having the crown darker and more purplish blue, the shorter upper tail coverts conspicuously tipped with bright light blue (forming a band about 5 mm. in width), pale blue separating the black of the forehead from the dark blue of the crown only slightly indicated, and size somewhat larger." ^[3]
• T. c. corallina (Berlepsch 1903)
• T. c. cyanocephala (Müller 1776)

Juvenile in Brazil

Description

It is mostly green with a black back and a blue head and throat. Plumage is described as "brilliant and varied, including areas of bright red, bright green, blue, and black." They can be observed in mixed-species flocks along with green-headed tanagers. ^[4]

References

1. BirdLife International (2016). "Tangara cyanocephala". IUCN Red List of Threatened Species . 2016: e.T22722830A94787225. doi: 10.2305/IUCN.UK.2016-3.RLTS.T22722830A94787225.en . Retrieved 12 November 2021.
2. Linné, Carl von; Houttuyn, M.; Houttuyn, M.; Linné, Carl von; Müller, Philipp Ludwig Statius (1776). Des Ritters Carl von Linné ... Vollständiges Natursystem : nach der zwölften lateinischen Ausgabe, und nach Anleitung des holländischen Houttuynischen Werks, mit einer ausführlichen Erklärung. Nürnberg: bey Gabriel Nicolaus Raspe.
3. Cory, Charles B. (1916). Descriptions of apparently new South American birds, with notes on some little known species; Fieldiana Ornithological Series Vol. 1, No.10. Field museum of natural history. Publication 190. Ornithological series.vol. I, no. 10. Chicago. pp. 345–346.
4. Moynihan, M. (1962). The organization and probable evolution of some mixed species flocks of neotropical birds. Smithsonian miscellaneous collections,v. 143, no. 7. Washington: Smithsonian Institution. p. 126.