Western spindalis

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Western spindalis
Western spindalis (Spindalis zena pretrei) male.JPG
Male Spindalis zena pretrei
Viñales, Cuba
Spindalis zena pretrei, Ciego de Avila Province, Cuba 2.jpg
Female Spindalis zena pretrei
Ciego de Ávila, Cuba
Scientific classification OOjs UI icon edit-ltr.svg
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Aves
Order: Passeriformes
Family: Spindalidae
Genus: Spindalis
Species:
S. zena
Binomial name
Spindalis zena
Spindalis zena map.svg
Synonyms

Fringilla zenaLinnaeus, 1758

Male Spindalis zena pretrei showing feathers on back, Cuba Western spindalis (Spindalis zena pretrei) male 2.JPG
Male Spindalis zena pretrei
showing feathers on back, Cuba

The western spindalis (Spindalis zena) is a songbird species. It was formerly considered conspecific with the other three species of Spindalis, with the common name stripe-headed tanager.

Contents

Taxonomy

The western spindalis was formally described in 1758 by the Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus in the tenth edition of his Systema Naturae . He placed it with the finches in the genus Fringilla and coined the binomial name Fringilla zena. [2] Linnaeus based his account on "The Bahama Finch" that had been described and illustrated in 1730 by the English naturalist Mark Catesby in his book The Natural History of Carolina, Florida and the Bahama Islands. [3] Linnaeus specified the type locality as southern America but this was restricted in 1936 by the Austrian ornithologist Carl Eduard Hellmayr to New Providence in the Bahamas. [4] [5] The western spindalis is now one of the four species placed in the genus Spindalis that was introduced in 1837 by William Jardine and Prideaux John Selby. [6] The specific epithet zena is from Ancient Greek ζηνα/zēna or ζηνη/zēnē, a type of finch, probably the European goldfinch. [7]

Five subspecies are recognised: [6]

The spindalises were traditionally considered aberrant tanagers of the family Thraupidae, but like the equally enigmatic bananaquit (Coereba flaveola), they are formally treated as incertae sedis (place uncertain) among the nine-primaried oscines until the recognition of the family Spindalidae.

Color

The male is brightly colored with a black and white horizontally striped head and contrasting burnt orange throat, breast and nape. The remainder of the belly is light grey. There are two color variations: green-backed (generally northern) and black-backed (generally northern). The female has similar markings on the head, but washed out to a medium grey. She is olive-grey above and greyish-brown below, with a slight orange wash on the breast, rump, and shoulders.

Size

The bird is 6.75''(17.1 cm) long, has wingspan of 9.5''(24.1 cm) and weighs 21g (0.75 oz)

Habitat and Ecology

The species is found in southeastern Florida and the western Caribbean (Cozumel, the Cayman Islands, Cuba, the Bahamas and the Turks and Caicos Islands). It is a rare visitor of extreme southern Florida, where the subspecies S. z. zena successfully bred in 2009.

Its natural habitats are subtropical or tropical moist lowland forests, subtropical or tropical moist montane forest, and heavily degraded former forest. The subspecies zena is found in pine forest and perches on fruit trees. It is a nonmigratory bird and has a lifespan of 3.29 years. [8]

Diet and Feeding Characteristics

They eat insects, larvae and fruit. [9]

These birds use two different foraging techniques: they glean for fruits, meaning they pluck fruit from the source and they hover for fruits. They typically look for food at medium to high heights off the ground. [10]

Conservation

It is not considered a threatened species by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). [1]

References

  1. 1 2 BirdLife International (2020). "Spindalis zena". IUCN Red List of Threatened Species . 2020: e.T22722522A137033144. doi: 10.2305/IUCN.UK.2021-3.RLTS.T22722522A137033144.en . Retrieved 12 November 2021.
  2. ↑ Linnaeus, Carl (1758). Systema Naturae per regna tria naturae, secundum classes, ordines, genera, species, cum characteribus, differentiis, synonymis, locis (in Latin). Vol. 1 (10th ed.). Holmiae (Stockholm): Laurentii Salvii. p. 181.
  3. ↑ Catesby, Mark (1729–1732). The Natural History of Carolina, Florida and the Bahama Islands (in English and French). Vol. 1. London: W. Innys and R. Manby. p. 42, Plate 42. Published in 11 parts. For the dates see: Overstreet, Leslie K. (2014). "The dates of the parts of Mark Catesby's The Natural History of Carolina ... (London, 1731–1743 [1729–1747])". Archives of Natural History. 41 (2): 362–364. doi:10.3366/anh.2014.0256.
  4. ↑ Hellmayr, Carl Eduard (1936). Catalogue of Birds of the Americas and the Adjacent Islands in Field Museum of Natural History. Field Museum Natural History Publications. Zoological Series. Vol. 13, Part 9: Tersinidae-Thraupidae. p. 239.
  5. ↑ Paynter, Raymond A. Jr, ed. (1970). Check-List of Birds of the World. Vol. 13. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Museum of Comparative Zoology. p. 317.
  6. 1 2 Gill, Frank; Donsker, David; Rasmussen, Pamela, eds. (August 2024). "Enigmatic Oscines". IOC World Bird List Version 14.2. International Ornithologists' Union. Retrieved 23 February 2025.
  7. ↑ Jobling, James A. "zena". The Key to Scientific Names. Cornell Lab of Ornithology. Retrieved 22 February 2025.
  8. ↑ Hilty, Steven (2020-03-04), Del Hoyo, Josep; Elliott, Andrew; Sargatal, Jordi; Christie, David; De Juana, Eduardo (eds.), "Western Spindalis (Spindalis zena)" , Birds of the World, Cornell Lab of Ornithology, doi:10.2173/bow.wesspi.01 , retrieved 2025-04-13
  9. ↑ Sibley, David (2003). The Sibley field guide to birds of eastern North America (1st ed.). New York: Alfred A. Knopf. p. 358. ISBN   978-0-679-45120-4.
  10. ↑ Cruz, Alexander (1974). "Feeding Assemblages of Jamaican Birds" . Oxford Journals Oxford University Press. 76 (1): 103–107. doi:10.2307/1365990. ISSN   0010-5422. JSTOR   1365990.


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