Rufous-browed peppershrike
The rufous-browed peppershrike is a passerine bird in the vireo family. It is widespread and often common in woodland, forest edge, and cultivation with some tall trees from Mexico and Trinidad south to Argentina and Uruguay.
Taxonomy
The rufous-browed peppershrike was formally described in 1789 by the German naturalist Johann Friedrich Gmelin in his revised and expanded edition of Carl Linnaeus's Systema Naturae. He placed it in the genus Tanagra and coined the binomial name Tanagra gujanensis. The specific epithet is derived from the type locality, the Guianas. Gmelin based his account on "Le verderoux" from French Guiana that had been described in 1778 by the French polymath Comte de Buffon in his multivolume Histoire Naturelle des Oiseaux. The rufous-browed peppershrike is now placed with the black-billed peppershrike in the genus Cyclarhis that was introduced in 1824 by William Swainson.Twenty two subspecies are recognised:C. g. septentrionalis Phillips, AR, 1991 – east MexicoC. g. flaviventris Lafresnaye, 1842 – southeast Mexico, Guatemala and north HondurasC. g. yucatanensis Ridgway, 1887 – Yucatán Peninsula C. g. insularis Ridgway, 1885 – Cozumel C. g. nicaraguae Miller, W & Griscom, 1925 – south Mexico to NicaraguaC. g. subflavescens Cabanis, 1861 – Costa Rica and west PanamaC. g. perrygoi Wetmore, 1950 – central west PanamaC. g. flavens Wetmore, 1950 – east PanamaC. g. coibae Hartert, EJO, 1901 – Coiba C. g. cantica Bangs, 1898 – north, central ColombiaC. g. flavipectus Sclater, PL, 1859 – northeast Venezuela and TrinidadC. g. parva Chapman, 1917 – northeast Colombia and north VenezuelaC. g. gujanensis – east Colombia and south Venezuela through the Guianas to northeast, central Brazil and east PeruC. g. cearensis Baird, SF, 1866 – east BrazilC. g. ochrocephala Tschudi, 1845 – southeast Brazil, Uruguay, Paraguay and northeast ArgentinaC. g. viridis – Paraguay and north ArgentinaC. g. virenticeps Sclater, PL, 1860 – west Ecuador and northwest PeruC. g. contrerasi Taczanowski, 1879 – southeast Ecuador and north PeruC. g. saturata Zimmer, JT, 1925 – central PeruC. g. pax Bond, J & Meyer de Schauensee, 1942 – central east BoliviaC. g. dorsalis Zimmer, JT, 1942 – central BoliviaC. g. tarijae Bond, J & Meyer de Schauensee, 1942 – southeast Bolivia and northwest Argentina
Description
The adult rufous-browed peppershrike is approximately long and weighs. It is bull-headed with a thick, somewhat shrike-like bill, which typically is blackish below and pinkish-grey above. The head is grey with a strong rufous eyebrow. The crown is often tinged with brown. The upperparts are green, and the yellow throat and breast shade into a white belly. The subspecies ochrocephala from the south-eastern part of its range has a shorter rufous eyebrow and a brown-tinged crown, while the subspecies virenticeps, contrerasi and saturata from north-western Peru and western Ecuador have greenish-yellow nape, auriculars and cheeks.The song is a whistled phrase with the rhythm "Do you wash every week?", but there are extensive variations depending on both individual and range. It is often heard but hard to see as it feeds on insects and spiders high in the foliage, though it has been observed to take small lizards as well.