All species › Passerines › Tanagers and allies › Saffron Finch
Saffron Finch | Sicalis flaveola
Gewone saffraangors | Chirigüe azafranado | Canário-da-terra
The Saffron Finch is a bright yellow finch with an orange forehead, widespread in open, dry country in the lowlands of South America. It often lives close to people, around houses, in parks and along roads, and is widely kept as a cage bird. In the guide area there are forms that differ mainly in the female plumage.
Voice
The song is a series of sharp, metallic chips and short whistles, often repeated at length from a roof, post or tree. The call is a short chip.
Recording: Cid Espínola — CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 · xeno-canto
Identification
13–14 cm, with a short, conical bill. The male is bright yellow below and yellowish olive above, with faint streaks on the mantle and an orange forehead and crown. In Colombia, Ecuador and Peru the female resembles the male, but is duller and less orange; in Bolivia (form pelzelni) the female is grey-brown and streaked, with little yellow. Juveniles are greyish and finely streaked, with a yellow band across the breast and yellow undertail coverts.
Confusion species
Orange-fronted Yellow Finch Sicalis columbiana is smaller, with a smaller orange patch on the forehead, and lives along the rivers of Amazonia and in the Llanos. Grassland Yellow Finch Sicalis luteola is heavily streaked above and lacks orange. Puna Yellow Finch Sicalis lutea and Greenish Yellow Finch Sicalis olivascens live higher in the Andes and have no orange forehead.
Habitat
Dry open country with scattered trees and shrubs, dry forest, pastures, fields, yards, parks and villages, in the guide area mainly in the lowlands and in dry valleys up to about 2000 m. It feeds on the ground on seeds, often in flocks. The nest is in a cavity, such as a tree hole, a gap in a wall or roof, or an old nest of another bird, including those of horneros.
Where the bird is most at home, classified by the vegetation units of the Andes and the west coast.
Range and movements
In Colombia widespread in the Caribbean lowlands, in the Magdalena and Cauca valleys and in the Llanos. In Ecuador in the dry west, from Manabí and Guayas to El Oro and Loja. In Peru in the north-west and south along the coast, and in the Marañón valley; the birds in and around Lima probably descend from escaped cage birds. In Bolivia in the eastern lowlands, including Santa Cruz and Tarija. Absent from the Galápagos. Outside the guide area in Venezuela, the Guianas, Brazil, Paraguay, Uruguay and Argentina; introduced to Hawaii, Jamaica, Puerto Rico and Panama, among other places.
- Resident
- dark = core range, pale = thinly spread
How and when to look
Look in villages, parks and around houses in the dry west of Ecuador and Peru, or in the Llanos, for small groups on lawns and along roads.
Conservation status
Least Concern. The species benefits from open, man-made habitats, but is locally trapped in large numbers as a cage bird.
Scientific name
Sicalis flaveola | (Linnaeus, 1766)
Linnaeus described the species in 1766 as Fringilla flaveola; 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 flaveolus, 'yellowish', a diminutive of flavus, 'yellow'. The specimen the first description was based on came from Suriname.