All species › Passerines › Swallows › White-rumped Swallow
White-rumped Swallow | Tachycineta leucorrhoa
Witstuitzwaluw | Golondrina cejiblanca | Andorinha-de-sobre-branco
The White-rumped Swallow is a blue-green-and-white swallow of open country in south-eastern South America, which in the guide area is common only in Bolivia. A narrow white line above the lores and the white rump are its marks. Southern birds move north in the austral winter and then add to the population in Bolivia.
Voice
A soft, somewhat buzzy trrit, and a twittering song of short trills.
Recording: Guy Kirwan — CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 · xeno-canto
Identification
13–14 cm, with a slightly forked tail. The upperparts are glossy blue-green. A narrow white line runs from the bill to above the eye. The rump is white. The tertials have narrow white edges, but there is no large white wing patch. The underparts are white. The sexes are nearly alike. Juveniles are greyish brown above, with a white rump.
Confusion species
Chilean Swallow Tachycineta leucopyga is darker, steel blue above, and lacks the white line above the lores; in the guide area it is a winter visitor to Bolivia. White-winged Swallow Tachycineta albiventer has a large white wing patch and no white line above the lores. Blue-and-white Swallow Pygochelidon cyanoleuca lacks a white rump and has black undertail coverts. Barn Swallow Hirundo rustica has a rufous throat and a long, deeply forked tail.
Habitat
Open and semi-open country with water: savanna, pasture, marshes, lakes, riverbanks and the edges of Chaco and dry forest, also around farms, in the lowlands and foothills to roughly 1500 m. It hunts flying insects low over open ground and water. It nests in cavities in trees, posts and buildings.
Where the bird is most at home, classified by the vegetation units of the Andes and the west coast.
Range and movements
In Bolivia in the lowlands of the east and south, also in the valleys at the foot of the Andes in the south; in the austral winter further north. In Peru rare in the south-east, probably as a migrant from the south. Absent from Colombia, Ecuador and the Galápagos. Outside the guide area in southern and central Brazil, Paraguay, Uruguay and northern and central Argentina.
- Resident
- dark = core range, pale = thinly spread
How and when to look
Check over pastures, marshes and lakes in the lowlands around Santa Cruz and in the Chaco of Bolivia, where small groups often perch on wires and fences.
Conservation status
Least Concern. The species is widespread and tolerates farmland well.
Scientific name
Tachycineta leucorrhoa | (Vieillot, 1817)
Vieillot described the species in 1817 as Hirundo leucorrhoa; because it was later moved to another genus, the author and year stand in brackets. The genus Tachycineta was introduced in 1851 by Cabanis. The genus name comes from Greek takhukinētos, 'moving quickly'. From Greek leukos, 'white', and orrhos, 'rump', after the white rump. The specimen the first description was based on came from Paraguay.