Yellow-shouldered Grassquit
Loxipasser anoxanthus
A small seed-eating species of forest edges, open woodlands, and nearby weedy areas; usually found in groups of two to five birds. Both sexes have bright yellow-green shoulders and a buff vent, which are diagnostic but can be difficult to see. Otherwise, the Black-faced Grassquit is rather similar, but can be distinguished by its slimmer bill and duller back. Furthermore, male Yellow-shouldered Grassquits have an entirely black head, whereas black is limited to the face on the Black-faced Grassquit. The song is a series of four or five high-pitched buzzy notes that either rising or dropping in pitch, followed by one to three notes at another different pitch.
Taxonomy
The yellow-shouldered grassquit was formally described in 1847 by the English naturalist Philip Henry Gosse as the "Yellow-back finch" in his book The Birds of Jamaica. Gosse coined the binomial name Spermophila anoxantha. The species was moved to the genus Loxipasser by the naturalist Henry Bryant in 1866. The genus name combines the word Loxia introduced by Carl Linnaeus in 1758 for the crossbills with Passer introduced by Mathurin Jacques Brisson in 1760 for the sparrows. The specific epithet anoxanthus is formed from the Ancient Greek anō meaning "above" or "upperparts" with xanthos meaning "yellow". The yellow-shouldered grassquit is monotypic: no subspecies are recognised.<p>Although the yellow-shouldered grassquit was traditionally placed with the buntings and New World sparrows in the family Emberizidae, molecular phylogenetic studies have shown that this species is a member of the subfamily Coerebinae within the tanager family Thraupidae.
- Scientific name
- Loxipasser anoxanthus
- Authority
- (Gosse, 1847)
- Order
- Passeriformes
- Family
- Fringillidae
- Genus
- Loxipasser
Range and habitat
- Migration
- Resident species
Conservation
- Population trend
- declining
Photos
Distribution
Bird Calls
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