Yellow-billed Pintail
Anas georgica
Handsome and generally common dabbling duck of wetlands, lakes, and river mouths. Sexes look alike with a bright yellow bill (duller for a short while on young birds), a plain and rather “soft-faced” brown head, and dark-mottled sides. Also note its elegant shape with a slender neck and long pointed tail. Yellow-billed Teal look somewhat similar (and often occurs in same areas) but Yellow-billed Teal are smaller and more compact with a darker head and plain grayish sides.
Identification
The yellow-billed pintail has a brown head and neck. The bill is yellow with a black tip and a black stripe down the middle.The tail is brownish and pointed. The upper wing is grayish-brown, and the secondaries are blackish-green. The rest of the body is buffish brown with varying-sized black spots. The species is sometimes confused with yellow-billed teal (Anas flavirostris) but can be differentiated by the yellow stripes on its bill, its larger size, and its tendency not to form large groups. The nominate subspecies is smaller and darker than Anas g. spinicauda. The yellow-billed pintail forms a superspecies with the northern pintail (Anas acuta).
Taxonomy
The yellow-billed pintail 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 with all the ducks, geese, and swans in the genus Anas and coined the binomial name Anas georgica. Gmelin based his description on the "Georgia duck" that had been described in 1785 by the English ornithologist John Latham in his A General Synopsis of Birds. The naturalist Joseph Banks had provided Latham with a water-colour drawing of the duck by Georg Forster who had accompanied James Cook on his second voyage to the Pacific Ocean. The watercolour was painted in 1775 in South Georgia. This picture is now the holotype for the species and is held by the Natural History Museum in London. The genus name Anas is the Latin word for a duck.<p>Three subspecies are recognised:
- Scientific name
- Anas georgica
- Authority
- Gmelin, JF, 1789
- Order
- Anseriformes
- Family
- Anatidae
- Genus
- Anas
Range and habitat
The range includes much of South America, the Falkland Islands, and South Georgia. The nominate and smallest subspecies, the South Georgia pintail A. g. georgica, is thought to number between 1000 and 1500 pairs and is found only in South Georgia. The Chilean, or brown, pintail A. g. spinicauda is widespread on the South American mainland from extreme southern Colombia southwards, as well as in the Falkland Islands, and numbers well over 110,000. Niceforo's pintail A. g. niceforoi, formerly found in central Colombia, is believed to be extinct, having been last recorded in 1952 (and described only in 1946). Their habitat ranges from high-elevation lakes and marshes to low-elevation lakes and rivers and coasts in open country.
- Migration
- Complete migrants
Conservation
- Population trend
- declining
Photos
Distribution
Bird Calls
Other Birds
White-throated Antbird
Oneillornis salvini
Attractive ant-following antbird of mature rainforest. It is an obligate ant-follower, and is usually found in pairs or family groups around army ant swarms. The two sexes are uniquely distinctive: males are gray with a white eyebrow and throat and fine white tail barring; females are rusty orange with faint black patterning and fine black tail barring. While it follows army ant swarms through a variety of mature and secondary rainforest habitats, its territories are usually centered around areas of dense undergrowth within mature rainforest, like in upland ravines and around tree fall gaps. Its song is a distinctive slow, descending series of wheezy whistled notes.
Yellow-breasted Flowerpecker
Prionochilus maculatus
Distinctive little bird with an olive-green back, striped yellow underparts, and a bright orange crown patch. Yellow-vented Flowerpecker is somewhat similar but lacks the orange crown and prominent white moustache stripe, and has more contrasting streaking on the underparts. Forages actively in fruiting and flowering trees, particularly mistletoe, moving at middle and upper levels of lowland and foothill forest and forest edge. Gives high-pitched chirps and chittering insect-like trills.
White-winged Flufftail
Sarothrura ayresi
Very rare, small rail of montane marshes. Extremely shy and elusive bird that is unlikely to be seen unless expressly looking for it. Dark on the back with a white belly. Male has a rufous hood. Both sexes show large white wing patches in flight. Known from a handful of shallow high-elevation marshes. May be migratory, though its habits are poorly understood. Call is a series of deep, hollow, two-part hoots.
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