White-eyes | Zosteropidae

Brilvogels | Anteojitos

Small, yellowish-green songbirds instantly recognised by the white eye-ring of tiny, dense feathers. The bill is short, sharp and slightly curved, and the tongue ends in a brush-like tip used to take nectar. The diet is broad: insects and spiders gleaned from leaves and flowers, nectar, and soft fruit that they pierce. Outside the breeding season white-eyes move in busy flocks that pass rapidly from tree to tree, kept together by a constant stream of thin, high-pitched contact calls. The song is a fast, varied warbling twitter. Pairs breed alone, building a delicate cup slung like a hammock in a branch fork. Incubation and fledging are notably short, each around eleven to twelve days. Zosterops is among the fastest-diversifying bird groups on Earth. From Africa and Asia, flocks have colonised countless islands and archipelagos and split into distinct species there in remarkably little time. In southern Africa they occupy forest edge, scrub, riverine woodland, savanna and gardens.