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Ashy-tailed Swift | Chaetura andrei
Andrés gierzwaluw | Vencejo de André | Andorinhão-de-andré
The Ashy-tailed Swift is a small, brownish Chaetura with a paler throat and tail, restricted to northern and central Venezuela. In the guide area it is only a very rare vagrant. Older reports from the south of the guide area largely refer to Sick's Swift, which was formerly included in this species.
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Voice
Dry, chattering chip notes, as in other Chaetura species; hardly described.
No recording with a suitable Creative Commons licence is available for this species yet.
Identification
11–12 cm, small, with a short tail with projecting shaft tips. Upperparts dark sooty brown, with a slightly paler, greyish-brown rump and an ashy-tinged tail. Throat pale grey, grading into darker greyish-brown underparts. The sexes are alike.
Confusion species
Sick's Swift Chaetura meridionalis is larger but otherwise very similar; a safe identification requires good photographs or a bird in the hand. Chimney Swift Chaetura pelagica is larger, with a darker rump. Short-tailed Swift Chaetura brachyura has a very short tail and a pale undertail. Grey-rumped Swift Chaetura cinereiventris has a blue-black back and a sharply contrasting grey rump.
Habitat
In Venezuela over dry and semi-humid deciduous forest, open woodland and wooded rivers in the lowlands. It hunts flying insects, often in mixed flocks with other swifts. It presumably nests in hollow trees.
Where the bird is most at home, classified by the vegetation units of the Andes and the west coast.
Range and movements
In the guide area only a very rare vagrant, most likely in eastern Colombia on the border with Venezuela. Not recorded in Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia or the Galápagos. Outside the guide area in northern and central Venezuela, including the Orinoco Valley.
How and when to look
A small, brownish Chaetura with a pale throat in eastern Colombia may be this species, but Sick's Swift and Chimney Swift must be ruled out. Take photographs from above and below.
Conservation status
Vulnerable. The population is small and declining owing to the loss of deciduous forest in Venezuela.
Scientific name
Chaetura andrei | Berlepsch & Hartert, 1902
Berlepsch & Hartert described the species in 1902 and placed it straight away in the genus where it still stands. The genus Chaetura was introduced in 1826 by Stephens. The genus name comes from Greek khaitē, 'long hair, bristle', and oura, 'tail', after the spiny tips of the tail feathers. The species name andrei honours Eugène André (1861–1922), a French naturalist and collector in Venezuela, Trinidad and the Guianas. The specimen the first description was based on came from Caicara del Orinoco, Venezuela.