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Yucatan Gnatcatcher | Polioptila albiventris
Yucatánmuggenvanger | Perlita yucateca
The Yucatan Gnatcatcher is a blue-grey gnatcatcher with much white in the face and wings, found only in the north of the Yucatán Peninsula. It was long treated as a form of a widespread tropical gnatcatcher that has now been split into White-browed Gnatcatcher and other species.
Voice
Nasal, mewing calls and a short, rapid series of chipping notes.
Recording: Bill Pyle — CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 · converted to mono · xeno-canto
Identification
10–11 cm. Upperparts blue-grey, underparts clean white. The male has a black crown bordered above the eye by a white supercilium; in the female the crown is grey. Face largely white. Wings with broad white edges to the inner secondaries. Tail long, black with white along the outer feathers. Bill short and thin.
Confusion species
White-browed Gnatcatcher Polioptila bilineata is very similar but has less white in the wings and face; the two barely overlap in the guide area. White-lored Gnatcatcher Polioptila albiloris also lives in northern Yucatán; the breeding male has a black cap reaching below the eye and no white supercilium. Blue-grey Gnatcatcher Polioptila caerulea is present in winter and has a white eye-ring and no black crown outside the breeding season.
Habitat
Dry scrub and low, dry deciduous forest in the north of the Yucatán Peninsula, especially near the coast. It gleans small insects and spiders from foliage, often flicking its tail.
Where the bird is most at home, classified by the vegetation units of Mexico and Central America.
Range and movements
Endemic to the north of the Yucatán Peninsula in Mexico. Does not occur outside the guide area.
- Resident
- dark = core range, pale = thinly spread
How and when to look
Search dry coastal forest and scrub in northern Yucatán. Look for the white in the wings and face, and compare with White-lored Gnatcatcher, which lives in the same area.
Conservation status
Not assessed separately by the IUCN; as part of the former, broader species it is listed as not threatened. Its small range makes it vulnerable to the loss of dry coastal forest.
Scientific name
Polioptila albiventris | Lawrence, 1885
Lawrence described the species in 1885 and placed it straight away in the genus where it still stands. The genus Polioptila was introduced in 1855 by Sclater. Polioptila is Greek, from polios 'grey' and ptilon 'feather': 'grey-feathered'. albiventris is Latin, from albus 'white' and venter 'belly', after the white underparts. The specimen the first description was based on came from Temax, Yucatán, Mexico.