All species › Passerines › Tanagers and allies › Bright-rumped Yellow Finch
Bright-rumped Yellow Finch | Sicalis uropygialis
Grijsrugsaffraangors | Chirigüe culigualdo | Canário-de-uropígio-amarelo
The Bright-rumped Yellow Finch is a yellow finch of the high central Andes, with a grey back and a bright yellow rump. It often lives close to people, in villages and around farms, and breeds in cavities in walls and roofs.
Voice
The song is a short series of chipping and buzzy notes, often given from a roof or wall. Flocks keep up a constant chirping.
No recording with a suitable Creative Commons licence is available for this species yet.
Identification
13–14 cm, with a short, conical bill. The male has a yellow head with grey ear-coverts, a grey, lightly streaked mantle and back, and a bright yellow rump. The underparts are yellow, with grey flanks. The wings and tail are dark with grey edges. The female is duller, with less yellow on the head and greyer underparts. Juveniles are drabber and finely streaked.
Confusion species
Puna Yellow Finch Sicalis lutea has a yellowish-olive mantle without grey and a uniform yellow head. Raimondi's Yellow Finch Sicalis raimondii resembles this species, but is smaller and lives lower, on the dry western slopes and in the coastal hills. Citron-headed Yellow Finch Sicalis luteocephala in Bolivia has an all-yellow head without grey ear-coverts and lives lower, in dry valleys. Greenish Yellow Finch Sicalis olivascens is olive-green, without grey.
Habitat
Puna grassland with rocks, stony slopes, fields and especially villages, farms and stone walls, mostly between about 3500 and 4800 m. It feeds on the ground on seeds, often in flocks. The nest is in a cavity in a wall, a roof or a rock crevice.
Where the bird is most at home, classified by the vegetation units of the Andes and the west coast.
Range and movements
Absent from Colombia, Ecuador and the Galápagos. In Peru in the central and southern Andes, from about Ancash and Junín south to Puno and Tacna. In Bolivia in the high Andes and on the altiplano in the west. Outside the guide area in northern Chile and north-western Argentina.
How and when to look
Check roofs and walls in high-altitude villages and around farms, where pairs and small groups perch and breed in cavities.
Conservation status
Least Concern. The species is locally common and benefits from settlements and buildings in the high Andes.
Scientific name
Sicalis uropygialis | (d'Orbigny, ACVMD & de Lafresnaye, 1837) (GBIF: Sicalis uropigyalis)
D'Orbigny, ACVMD & de Lafresnaye described the species in 1837 as Emberiza uropigyalis; because it was later moved to another genus, the author and year stand in brackets. The genus Sicalis was introduced in 1828 by Boie. The genus name comes from Greek sikalis, a small black-headed bird, perhaps a warbler of the genus Sylvia. The species name comes from Latin uropygium, 'stuit', for the bright yellow rump. The specimen the first description was based on came from Andes, Bolivia.