All species › Passerines › Tyrant flycatchers and allies › Ash-breasted Tit-Tyrant
Ash-breasted Tit-Tyrant | Anairetes alpinus
Grijsborstmeestiran | Cachudito pechicenizo | Tiranete-chapim-de-peito-cinza
The Ash-breasted Tit-Tyrant is a rare tyrant of Polylepis woodland high in the Andes of Peru and Bolivia. It is greyer and less contrastingly patterned than the other tit-tyrants, with a white central crown between blackish crest feathers. Because of the loss of Polylepis woodland it is classed as Vulnerable.
Voice
The song is thought to be a rising, burry note followed by short, descending notes; calls are a plaintive feeet, a short soft trill and pip notes.
Recording: Joseph Tobias and Nathalie Seddon — CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 · xeno-canto
Identification
13 cm. Blackish crest of elongated feathers on the sides of the crown, with a white central crown; head dark grey, upperparts soft grey with faint blackish streaks. Wings blackish with two broad white wing bars and whitish edges to the inner flight feathers. Tail black above, mostly white below. Breast and flanks soft grey, belly and undertail coverts whitish to very faintly yellow. Bill black; iris hazel. Sexes alike. The subspecies bolivianus (southern Peru and Bolivia) has a blacker crown and a whiter belly.
Confusion species
Tufted Tit-Tyrant Anairetes parulus is smaller, with a curled crest, a pale iris and a streaked throat and breast. Yellow-billed Tit-Tyrant Anairetes flavirostris is smaller, with a streaked breast, a yellow lower mandible and a yellowish belly. White-throated Tyrannulet Mecocerculus leucophrys has no crest, a white throat and buffy to whitish wing bars.
Habitat
Groves and thickets of Polylepis and Gynoxys on steep, rocky, grassy slopes, between 3700 and 4600 m. It searches for insects in the foliage of these groves, usually in pairs.
Where the bird is most at home, classified by the vegetation units of the Andes and the west coast.
Range and movements
Peru: the nominate form on the west slope in northern La Libertad, Áncash and Lima; bolivianus in Cusco and Apurímac. Bolivia: bolivianus in north-western La Paz. Colombia and Ecuador: absent. Absent from the Galápagos.
- Resident
- dark = core range, pale = thinly spread
How and when to look
Search high-altitude Polylepis groves, for example at Abra Málaga in Cusco; the bird stays in the same groves all year.
Conservation status
Vulnerable. The population is estimated at 150 to 700 mature individuals and is decreasing. Threats are overgrazing and fire, which prevent Polylepis regeneration, and the cutting of Polylepis for timber, firewood and charcoal. The species occurs in a few national parks in Peru and Bolivia.
Scientific name
Anairetes alpinus | (Carriker, 1933)
Carriker described the species in 1933 as Yanacea alpina; because it was later moved to another genus, the author and year stand in brackets. The genus Anairetes was introduced in 1850 by Reichenbach. The genus name comes from Greek anairetēs, 'destroyer, slayer'. The species name comes from Latin alpinus, 'alpine, of high mountains'. The specimen the first description was based on came from Yanac, Áncash, Peru.