Mauritius Gray White-eye
Zosterops mauritianus
An unusual white-eye that lacks white around the eye, but has a puffy white rump patch. Mostly pale gray with a white throat and buff flanks. Found in virtually all habitats with woody vegetation on the island of Mauritius. A conspicuous, sociable bird that is usually found in flocks. Vaguely similar to the rare Mauritius White-eye, but easily separated by the lack of a white eye-ring and the lack of olive-green in the plumage. The song is a repetitive series of warbling notes, typical of a white-eye. The calls are “tew” notes and squeals.
Taxonomy
The Mauritius grey white-eye 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 the wagtails in the genus Motacilla and coined the binomial name Motacilla mauritiana. Gmelin based his account on the "Figuier bleu" that had been described in 1778 by the French polymath, the Comte de Buffon, in his Histoire Naturelle des Oiseaux. A hand-coloured engraving by François-Nicolas Martinet was published to accompany Buffon's text. The Mauritius grey white-eye is now placed with around one hundred white-eyes in the genus Zosterops that was introduced in 1827 by Nicholas Vigors and Thomas Horsfield.
- Scientific name
- Zosterops mauritianus
- Authority
- (Gmelin, JF, 1789)
- Order
- Passeriformes
- Family
- Zosteropidae
- Genus
- Zosterops
Range and habitat
- Migration
- Resident species
Conservation
- Population trend
- unknown
Photos
Distribution
Other Birds
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