All species › Passerines › Vireos › Black-whiskered Vireo
Black-whiskered Vireo | Vireo altiloquus
Baardvireo | Vireo bigotudo
The Black-whiskered Vireo is the characteristic vireo of the Caribbean: it breeds on almost every island, from the Bahamas to Grenada and the ABC Islands. In the breeding season its song is one of the most frequently heard bird sounds in forest and gardens on many islands. Most birds winter in northern South America. In Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic it is called julián chiví, after its song.
Voice
The song consists of short, melodious phrases of two or three syllables, each different and separated by pauses, repeated throughout the day from the canopy, such as joo-lee-an... chee-vee. Only males sing. Calls include a nasal yeeea, a short whit-whit and a harsh, mewing scold.
Recording: Noah Khanti Steinberg — CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 · converted to mono · xeno-canto
Identification
15–16.5 cm, a fairly large, elongated vireo with a stout bill. The crown is grey and the upperparts olive-green, without wing bars. A white supercilium is bordered below by a dark eye-stripe. The diagnostic feature is the narrow black malar stripe along the throat, visible at close range but not always in the field. The underparts are whitish, tinged yellowish on the flanks and undertail coverts. Adults have a red iris, juveniles a brown one. The sexes are alike. Subspecies differ in bill size and tone; birds from the western islands (San Andrés, Providencia) have a heavy bill.
Confusion species
Red-eyed Vireo Vireo olivaceus, a passage migrant in the region, is very similar but lacks the malar stripe, has a smaller bill and a more sharply defined grey crown with a black border. Yucatan Vireo Vireo magister on Grand Cayman is browner, with a less distinct supercilium and no malar stripe. The rare Yellow-green Vireo Vireo flavoviridis has yellower flanks and undertail and also lacks a malar stripe.
Habitat
Almost any wooded habitat: dry and moist forest, coastal woodland, mangrove, montane forest, shade coffee, and parks and gardens with tall trees, from sea level into the mountains. It forages in the canopy, gleaning insects from leaves, and also eats much small fruit. The nest is a hanging cup in a horizontal fork.
Where the bird is most at home, classified by the vegetation types of the Caribbean.
Range and movements
Breeds in the Bahamas, the Turks and Caicos Islands, Cuba, the Cayman Islands, Jamaica, Hispaniola (Haiti and the Dominican Republic), Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, the Lesser Antilles south to Grenada, the ABC Islands and San Andrés and Providencia. In Trinidad and Tobago it is seldom recorded. Birds from the Bahamas, Cuba, Jamaica and Puerto Rico move to northern South America and the Amazon Basin for the winter; in Hispaniola and some other islands part of the population stays. Outside the region it breeds in southern Florida and along the coast of the Yucatán Peninsula.
- Resident
- dark = core range, pale = thinly spread
How and when to look
From March to August it can be heard in almost any forest, including hotel grounds and town parks. The singing bird often sits high and hidden in the foliage; patience at the calling tree usually gives a good view, when the malar stripe and red iris can be checked to rule out Red-eyed Vireo.
Conservation status
Not threatened. The species is common on most islands and tolerates secondary forest, plantations and gardens with trees.
Scientific name
Vireo altiloquus | (Vieillot, 1808)
Vieillot described the species in 1808 as Muscicapa altiloqua; because it was later moved to another genus, the author and year stand in brackets. The genus Vireo was introduced in 1808 by Vieillot. Vireo was used by Latin authors for a small, green, migratory bird, probably the Eurasian golden oriole, though the European greenfinch has also been suggested. altiloquus is Latin, from altus 'high, loud' and loqui 'to speak', after the loud, endlessly repeated song. The specimen the first description was based on came from St Thomas, US Virgin Islands.