Fuscous flycatcher
The fuscous flycatcher is a small passerine bird in the family Tyrannidae, the tyrant flycatchers. It is found in Trinidad and Tobago and in every mainland South American country except Chile.
Taxonomy and systematics
The fuscous flycatcher was originally described as Muscipeta fuscata. It was later transferred to genus Empidochanes and still later to its current genus Cnemotriccus, where it was originally called the dusky flycatcher.The fuscous flycatcher has these seven subspecies:
- C. f. cabanisi
- C. f. duidae Zimmer, JT, 1938
- C. f. fumosus
- C. f. fuscatior
- C. f. beniensis Nils [Carl Gustaf Fersen Gyldenstolpe|Gyldenstolpe], 1941
- C. f. bimaculatus
- C. f. fuscatus
Description
The fuscous flycatcher is long and weighs about. The sexes have the same plumage. Adult males of the nominate subspecies C. f. fuscatus have a brown crown with a slight rufescent tinge. They have dusky lores, a whitish line above the lores that continues as a supercilium, and a dusky stripe through the eye. Their upperparts are brown with a slight rufescent tinge. Their wings are dusky with wide buffy ends on the coverts that show as two wing bars. Their inner secondaries have thin buff edges and their tertials have whitish edges. Their tail is long and dusky with brown edges on the feathers. Their throat is whitish, their breast olive-gray to grayish brown, and their belly pale yellow. They have a blackish iris, a long thin black bill with a dull pinkish base to the mandible, and black legs and feet.The other subspecies of the fuscous flycatcher differ from the nominate and each other thus:
- C. f. duidae: dark brown crown and back, rich olive-brown breast, pale yellow belly, and entirely pale yellow-orange mandible.
- C. f. fuscatior: similar to duidae with dark brown crown and back but less rich olive-brown breast, a somewhat yellower belly, and a completely dark bill
- C. f. bimaculatus: like nominate except for dull brownish gray breast and white belly and completely black bill
- C. f. beniensis: similar to bimaculatus
- C. f. cabanisi: two color morphs; one with grayish upperparts and white belly, the other with brown upperparts and yellow belly
- C. f. fumosus: intermediate between the brown/yellow morph of cabanisi and ''duidae''
Distribution and habitat
The subspecies of the fuscous flycatcher are found thus:- C. f. cabanisi: from northern and eastern Colombia into northwestern and northern Venezuela north of the Orinoco River; Trinidad, Tobago, and Monos and Chacachacare Islands
- C. f. duidae: central and southern Amazonas state in southern Venezuela and adjoining upper Negro River basin in northwestern Brazil
- C. f. fumosus: the Guianas and Brazil north of the Amazon from the Branco River east to the Atlantic
- C. f. fuscatior: from western Apure in western Venezuela south through southeastern Colombia, eastern Ecuador, eastern Peru and east from them in Brazil south of the Amazon to the Tocantins River In Ecuador known mostly along the Napo River
- C. f. beniensis: Pando and Beni departments in northern Bolivia
- C. f. bimaculatus: southeastern Peru, central and eastern Bolivia, southern and eastern Brazil, Paraguay, and northern Argentina from Jujuy to Corrientes provinces
- C. f. fuscatus: southeastern Brazil between Bahia and Rio Grande do Sul and into northeastern Argentina's Misiones Province
The fuscous flycatcher inhabits a variety of landscapes; in all of them it favors thick shady undergrowth. Subspecies C. f. fuscatior is found in humid forest and woodlands both primary and secondary, especially along watercourses in terrain such as várzea, and on river islands. C. f. duidae is mostly restricted to forest on sandy and other nutrient-poor soils. C. f. cabanisi is often found in drier woodlands and in gallery forest in more open country. In Brazil the species is mostly found from sea level to but locally higher. In Venezuela it is found as high as but mostly below north of the Orinoco and only to about south of it. It reaches in Colombia, in Ecuador, in Peru, and in Bolivia.