Bulletin 397 - Colombia 2021 #14 - Tanagers Pt 3

 I finally made it back to Colombia for my second visit and again used the guide services of Pablo Florez. I went with my friend Martin Jackson. We visited Inirida on the Orinoco, Santa Marta of course, Guajira Peninsula on the Caribbean coast, and a couple of National Parks around Bogota.

Tanagers are a large New World family of mostly colorful birds. They include seedeaters, conebills, tanagers, flowerpiercers etc. Any birding trip to the tropics will find a large number of them.

The 5.25 " Blue-backed Conebill (Conirostrum sitticolor) is an easy ID with his black head, rusty underparts, and blue back.

Blue-backed Conebill

The 5" Hooded Tanager (Nemosia pileata) is a rather plain colored tanager. The male is white below, gray above and he has a black hood. He has a bright yellow eye.

Hooded Tanager

The 7"  Blue-capped Tanager (Sporothraupis cyanocephala) has a blue head, olive back, light blue breast and yellow under the tail.

Blue-capped Tanager

The male 6" Red-shouldered Tanager (Tachyphonus phoenicius) is an all black bird with a silver bill. The small red shoulder patch is usually hidden.

Red-shouldered Tanager - male

The female Red-shouldered Tanager is dull brown on her head and back and white below.

Red-shouldered Tanager - female

T

he 7" Wedge-tailed Grass-Finch (Emberizoides herbicola) looks more like a non-descript sparrow than a brightly colored tanager.

Wedge-tailed Grass-Finch

Flowerpiercers are tanagers with hooked upper mandibles,. They make a small hole in the base of the flower and draw the nectar from there.

The 6" Glossy Flowerpiercer (Diglossa lafresmayii) is black with a light shoulder patch.

Glossy Flowerpiercer

The 6" Masked Flowerpiercer (Diglossa cyanea) is dark blue with a black mask and red eye.

Masked Flowerpiercer

The 5" male White-naped Seedeater (Dolospingus fringilloides) is the typical black and white pattern seen in other seedeaters. Its habitat is the white sand forest along the Orinoco River. This was a target bird for the Inirida section of the trip and we finally saw it the last morning.

White-naped Seedeater

Lastly is the 4.5" male Purple Honeycreeper (Cyanerpes caeruleus). It is bright purplish blue, with black wings, throat and mask. The best feature to ID is the bright yellow legs. This was my best ever view of this bird.

Purple Honeycreeper

I put the different bird/mammal families in single folders for easy viewing

I have photos of 114 of the 385 species of tanagers

Happy birding and photography,

David McDonald

dkmmdpa@gmail.com

photos copyright 2006 - 2022 David McDonald

To have these trip reports sent to your email, please email me at the above address and ask to subscribe.

Bulletin 284 - Colombia #7 - Tanagers part 2

Pablo Florez, the main guide, has co-written a book where to bird in Colombia. In it, he has a list of the Top 30 Most Sought-after Birds by a group of 40 birders visiting Colombia. I saw 12 of them on the trip and got photos of 10. When I show one of these birds,  I will mention its placement on the list.

As everyone knows, the tanager family (Thraupidae) has some of the most colorful birds. In the first part we saw a number of them, so here are the rest from this remarkable trip.

The Bangsia genus consists of just 5 species of tanagers. These are birds of the mountains and until recently some of them have been rarely seen. These tanagers have relatively short tails. One of them is resident in Costa Rica and Panama, the Blue-and-gold Tanager. I saw and photographed it earlier this year. in Costa Rica. The other 4 are in Colombia and 2 are endemic and we saw both at Tatama National Park in the cloud forest.

The 6" Black-and-gold Tanager (Bangsia melanochlamys) is more common than the next one, but it still is an uncommon bird and is #8 on the list of most sought after birds in Colombia. It is listed as vulnerable.  This was a lifer.

Black-and-gold Tanager 

The 6" Gold-ringed Tanager (Bangsia aureocincta) is perhaps the most famous tanager in Colombia as it is on the cover of both 'Field Guide to Birds of Columbia' and 'Birdwatching in Colombia'.. In the Steven Hilty 1986 classic "Guide to the Birds of Colombia", he says this bird is poorly known from only 2 mountainous areas. It is listed as endangered and is #5 on the list of most sought-after birds in Colombia. The male is green with a black head and an incomplete gold ring on sides of head. This was a lifer.

Gold-ringed Tanager - male

The female is similar, except the black of head is replaced by green.

Gold-ringed Tanager - female

The 7" Blue-capped Tanager (Thraupis cyanocephala) is blue and yellow. It is much more colorful than the illustration in the guide books. This was a lifer. 

Blue-capped Tanager

The 7" Purplish-mantled Tanager (Iridosornis porphyrocephalus) has a purple hood and yellow throat. This was a lifer.

Purplish-mantled Tanager

The next one is a bird that I have loved the photo in the guide books for 20 years and finally I saw it on this trip. It is the 6" Swallow Tanager (Tersina viridis). The male is turquoise with a black face and a pale blue belly with some horizontal black streaks on flanks.

Swallow Tanager - male

The female is green and she lacks the black face.

 Swallow Tanager - female

The tangara genus of small tanagers are often the most colorful and here are 2 from the trip. Both were birds I had seen before. The 5" Plain-colored Tanager (Tangara inornata) as the name suggests is the exception to the rule. It is gray with a blue wing patch.

Plain-colored Tanager

The 5" Scrub Tanager (Tangara vitriolina) is aqua with a rufous cap.

Scrub Tanager

Finally, flowerpiercers are tanagers with a specialized hooked upper beak for making holes in the base of flowers and directly getting the nectar. 2 of them were colorful on this trip. The 6" Masked Flowerpiercer (Diglossa cyanea) is bright blue with a black mask and bright red eye.

Masked Flowerpiercer

The 5" Chestnut-bellied Flowerpiercer (Diglossa gloriosissima) is black with a rufous belly. This endangered species is endemic to Colombia and found only on two mountain tops. This bird was photographed at Tatama National Park. 

Chestnut-bellied Flowerpiercer

I have updated my tanager family photos and have 97 of the 370 species here.

Happy birding and photography,

David McDonald
dkmmdpa@gmail.com

photos copyright 2006 - 2017 David McDonald

To have these trip reports sent to your email, please email me at the above address and ask to subscribe.

Bulletin 237 - Best of 10 years - Tanagers

The tanager family (thraupidae) is a large New World family of 368 species. Many of them are brightly colored and most are in the tropics. The famous Darwin's 'finches' of the Galapagos are also tanagers. Unfortunately, except for a couple of vagrants, there are no longer any tanager family birds in North America, as the Scarlet, Summer and Western Tanagers have been reclassified and placed in the cardinal family.

These photos have been taken over the past 2 years in Panama, Costa Rica, Ecuador and the Caribbean. The Crimson-collared Tanager is perhaps my favorite of the tanager photos.

Crimson-collared Tanager - male

The Blue-Gray Tanager is found widely in the tropics and most birders have seen it. It is also readily attracted to banana feeders.

Blue-gray Tanager

Another blue one is the Masked Flowerpiercer. He is distinctive with his red eye and black mask.

Masked Flowerpiercer - male

The Red-legged Honeycreeper is an even brighter blue. This is another very common bird in the tropics.

Red-legged Honeycreeper - male

Among yellow birds, the Saffron Finch is a bird of South America, but it has also been introduced in Hawaii where this photo was taken.

Saffron Finch - male

The Golden Tanager is another South American bird. 

Golden Tanager

The Silver-throated Tanager is yellow with a silver throat and black streaking on the back.

Silver-throated Tanager

The male Green Honeycreeper is almost iridescent. The black face and yellow bill confirm the ID. The birds in Ecuador like this one are more a blue-green then green.

Green Honeycreeper - male

The Green-and-gold Tanager is mostly green bodied with black streaking.

Green-and-gold Tanager

The Bay-headed Tanager is a sentimental favorite of mine. On my first trip to Costa Rica in 1994, it was one of the birds on the cover of the Costa Rica bird book, so I was familiar with the colors. On the first morning of the trip, we drove to a national park and the first bird I saw when I stepped out of the van was one of these!

Bay-headed Tanager

Lastly is the Hispaniolan Spindalis. This is one of 4 Caribbean species that was split from what was known as the Stripe-headed Tanager until the split about 15 years ago. I got a nice photo with him eating a berry.

Hispaniolan Spindalis - male

I hope that everyone gets a chance to visit the tropics and see some of these beautiful birds.

Happy birding and photography,

David McDonald
dkmmdpa@gmail.com

photos copyright 2006 - 2015 David McDonald

To have these trip reports sent to your email, please email me at the above address and ask to subscribe.