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Peruvian Sierra Finch | Phrygilus punensis
Punasierragors | Yal peruano | Tico-tico-peruano
The Peruvian Sierra Finch is a sturdy finch with a grey hood, an olive-brown back and yellow underparts, of the humid puna and inter-Andean valleys of Peru and Bolivia. It is one of the commonest birds around Andean villages, fields and Polylepis groves. It is closely related to Grey-hooded Sierra Finch Phrygilus gayi, of which it was formerly treated as a subspecies.
Voice
The song is a short, simple series of whistled and twittering notes, often from a roof, wall or shrub. The call is a short, metallic tchip.
Recording: Mike Nelson — CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 · xeno-canto
Identification
16 cm, with a conical grey bill. The male has a slate-grey head, throat and upper breast. The mantle is olive-brown to olive-yellow, and the rump grey. The breast and belly are yellow, the undertail coverts whitish. The wings and tail are grey with dark centres. The female is duller, with a browner grey hood, a faintly streaked back and paler yellow underparts. Juveniles are browner and streaked above and below.
Confusion species
Black-hooded Sierra Finch Phrygilus atriceps has a black hood and a golden-brown back, and lives in the drier puna in the south-west. Ash-breasted Sierra Finch Geospizopsis plebejus is smaller, grey and streaked, without yellow. Plumbeous Sierra Finch Geospizopsis unicolor is uniform lead-grey (male) or brown and streaked (female). Puna Yellow Finch Sicalis lutea and other yellow finches have a yellow head.
Habitat
Shrubby grassland of the humid puna, scrub in inter-Andean valleys, Polylepis groves, fields, terraces, hedgerows and villages, roughly between 2500 and 4500 m. It feeds on the ground and in shrubs on seeds and insects, in small flocks outside the breeding season. The nest is placed in a shrub, a rock crevice or a wall.
Where the bird is most at home, classified by the vegetation units of the Andes and the west coast.
Range and movements
In Peru in the Andes of the centre and south, from Ancash and Huánuco south to Puno. In Bolivia in the Andes of the north and centre, in La Paz, Cochabamba and neighbouring departments. Absent from Colombia, Ecuador and the Galápagos. Hardly occurs outside the guide area.
- Resident
- dark = core range, pale = thinly spread
How and when to look
Look around villages, ruins and fields in the Andes of southern Peru, for example around Cusco and Lake Titicaca. The birds often sit on walls and roofs and feed in farmyards.
Conservation status
Least Concern. Common; the species benefits from small-scale farmland.
Scientific name
Phrygilus punensis | Ridgway, 1887
Ridgway described the species in 1887 and placed it straight away in the genus where it still stands. The genus Phrygilus was introduced in 1844 by Cabanis. The genus name comes from Ancient Greek phrugilos, an unidentified bird mentioned by Aristophanes. The species name refers to the puna, the high Andean grasslands. The specimen the first description was based on came from Lake Titicaca basin, Peru/Bolivia.