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Olive-backed Euphonia | Euphonia gouldi
Olijfrugorganist | Eufonia olivácea
The Olive-backed Euphonia differs from most euphonias: both sexes are green rather than blue-black and yellow. It lives in humid lowland forest on the Caribbean side of the guide area, from south-eastern Mexico to western Panama, and is often one of the commonest euphonias there along forest edges and in secondary forest.
Voice
The call is a dry, rapid chididit or a rolling trrr, as well as a clear pee. The song is a short, hurried series of chirps and whistled notes.
Recording: Kent Livezey — CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 · converted to mono · xeno-canto
Identification
9–10 cm. Small and stocky, with a short, thick bill. Male: upperparts glossy olive-green with a bronze sheen; forehead bright yellow. Throat and breast olive-yellow, flanks olive-green; centre of belly and undertail coverts rufous-chestnut. Female: like the male, but the forehead rufous instead of yellow and the underparts slightly greyer olive, with a smaller rufous patch on belly and undertail.
Confusion species
Females of other euphonias, such as Yellow-throated Euphonia Euphonia hirundinacea and White-vented Euphonia Euphonia minuta, are also olive-green, but lack the rufous belly centre and rufous undertail. The female Orange-bellied Euphonia Euphonia xanthogaster has a rufous forehead like the female Olive-backed, but a grey nape and greyer underparts without a rufous belly.
Habitat
Humid lowland and foothill forest, mainly in the middle and upper levels, forest edges, tall secondary forest, clearings with trees and shade plantations; mainly below 1000 m. It lives in pairs or small groups and often joins mixed flocks. It feeds mainly on mistletoe berries and other small fruit.
Where the bird is most at home, classified by the vegetation units of Mexico and Central America.
Range and movements
Endemic to the guide area. Caribbean side of south-eastern Mexico (southern Veracruz, Oaxaca, Tabasco, Chiapas and the south of the Yucatán Peninsula) through Belize, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua to Costa Rica and western Panama (Bocas del Toro).
- Resident
- dark = core range, pale = thinly spread
How and when to look
The dry, rolling chididit often gives the species away in the canopy; on a green euphonia, the rufous belly centre is the first thing to check.
Conservation status
Not threatened (LC). Fairly common in the Caribbean lowlands, also in secondary forest; it declines where forest disappears completely.
Scientific name
Euphonia gouldi | Sclater, 1857
Sclater described the species in 1857 and placed it straight away in the genus where it still stands. The genus Euphonia was introduced in 1806 by Desmarest, A-G. Euphonia is Greek, from eu 'good' and phōnē 'sound': 'sweet-voiced', after the pleasing calls. gouldi honours the English naturalist, publisher and bird artist John Gould (1804–1881). The specimen the first description was based on came from Guatemala.