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Bronze Sunbird | Nectarinia kilimensis
Bronshoningzuiger | Suimanga Bronceado
The Bronze Sunbird is a long-tailed highland sunbird whose male shines bronze and copper at close range but looks black from a distance. Within the region it is best known from the eastern highlands of Zimbabwe.
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Voice
A loud double chee-chee or cheep-chweep, often repeated. The song is a high, fast and rather high twitter ending in a descending series, delivered from a treetop or tall bush.
Recording: Jonathan Onongo — CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 · converted to mono · xeno-canto
Identification
The male measures 21 to 23 cm including the long central tail feathers, the female about 14 cm. The male's head, back and breast have a bronze-green gloss that flashes coppery in full sun; the wings, belly and tail are black. There are no pectoral tufts. The female is olive-grey above with a pale supercilium and a dark ear patch, and yellowish below with distinct dark streaks; the tail is short and dark with pale edges. Young males resemble the female but have a blackish throat. The bill is long and strongly decurved.
Confusion species
Malachite Sunbird (Nectarinia famosa) is bright emerald-green with yellow pectoral tufts; its female is barely streaked. The male Scarlet-Tufted Sunbird (Nectarinia johnstoni) on the Nyika Plateau is greener, longer-tailed and has red pectoral tufts. In Angola, the male Bocage's Sunbird (Nectarinia bocagii) is darker, glossed violet-blue with a black belly. Amethyst Sunbird (Chalcomitra amethystina) is velvet-black with a green crown and purple throat and has a short tail.
Habitat
Montane forest edges, clearings with bracken and shrubs, highland pasture with scattered trees, river valleys, plantations, villages and gardens, mostly above 1,200 m. It mainly visits flowering Leonotis, coral trees, aloes and garden plants, and catches insects in short sallies.
Where the bird is most at home, classified by the vegetation units of southern Africa.
Range and movements
In Zimbabwe common in the eastern highlands from Nyanga through the Vumba to Chimanimani, and in adjacent western Mozambique. Also in the highlands of Malawi and north-eastern Zambia, and in isolation in the highlands and western escarpment of Angola. Beyond the region it occurs in the highlands of East Africa to Kenya, Uganda and eastern DR Congo.
- Resident
- Summer visitor (c. Oct–Mar)
- Winter visitor (c. Apr–Sep)
- Passage (Mar–Apr, Oct–Nov)
- dark = core range, pale = thinly spread
How and when to look
In Zimbabwe it is easy to find in gardens, hotel grounds and along forest edges in the Vumba and around Nyanga, especially on flowering Leonotis. Look at a male in sunlight to see the bronze gloss; in shade the bird appears wholly black. A yellow, finely streaked female with a pale supercilium in these highlands usually belongs to this species.
Conservation status
Not threatened. The species is locally common and adapts well to gardens and small-scale farming. Loss of forest edge and scrub to clearing and pine plantations may cause local declines.
Scientific name
Nectarinia kilimensis | Shelley, 1885
Shelley described the species in 1885 and placed it straight away in the genus where it still stands. The genus Nectarinia was introduced in 1811 by Illiger. Nectarinia derives from the Greek nektar, the drink of the gods in Greek mythology, via nektarinos, 'of nectar' — for the flower nectar on which sunbirds feed. kilimensis means 'of Kilimanjaro', the mountain in Tanzania where the first specimen was collected. The specimen the first description was based on came from Kilimanjaro, Tanzania (c. 1,500 m).