Wikipedia / Myiarchus
Wikipedia / Myiarchus
Myiarchus is a genus of birds in the tyrant flycatcher family Tyrannidae. Most species are fairly similar in appearance and are easier to separate by voice than by plumage.
Myiarchus flycatchers are fairly large tyrant-flycatchers at 16–23cm (6.3–9in) long. They are all partially crested with a brown to gray back and head, a rufous to blackish tail and yellow to pale underparts (only exception is the rufous flycatcher with rufous underparts). They typically forage by perching on an open branch and looking outward and downward for prey, which primarily consists of insects. Once it spots a potential meal, the flycatcher rapidly and directly flies at the insect, which is normally on the exposed upper surface of a leaf or twig. It hovers briefly before the insect before grabbing it in its beak and flying away to typically a new perch.
Taxonomy
The genus Myiarchus was introduced in 1844 by the German ornithologist Jean Cabanis. The name combines the Ancient Greek muia meaning "fly" with arkhos meaning "ruler" or "chief". Cabanis did not specify a type species for the genus but this was designated as the short-crested flycatcher by George Gray in 1855.
The genus contains 22 species:
Image | Scientific name | Common Name | Distribution |
| Myiarchus semirufus | northwestern Peru | |
Myiarchus yucatanensis | Yucatan peninsula | ||
| Myiarchus barbirostris | Jamaica | |
| Myiarchus tuberculifer | Neotropics | |
| Myiarchus swainsoni | South America | |
| Myiarchus venezuelensis | northern Venezuela and Colombia | |
| Myiarchus panamensis | Panama and Colombia | |
| Myiarchus ferox | South America | |
| Myiarchus apical | Colombia | |
| Myiarchus cephalotes | northern Andes | |
| Myiarchus phaecocephalus | western Ecuador and northern Peru | |
| Myiarchus cinerascens | southwestern US and Mexico | |
| Myiarchus nuttingi | Mesoamerica | |
| Myiarchus crinnitus | eastern North America ;winters to Central America | |
| Myiarchus tyranulus | Neotropics | |
| Myiarchus magnirostris | Galápagos Islands | |
| Myiarchus nugator | Grenada and St Vincent | |
| Myiarchus validus | Jamaica | |
| Myiarchus sagrae | northern Antilles | |
| Myiarchus stolidus | Jamaica and Hispaniola | |
| Myiarchus antillarum | Puerto Rico | |
| Myiarchus oberi | Lesser Antilles |
References
External links