Red-billed Pied Tanager

Overview

The red-billed pied tanager (Lamprospiza melanoleuca) is a bird species currently classified in the family Mitrospingidae, having previously been placed in the Thraupidae for over two centuries. It is the sole member of its genus and exists without recognised subspecies.

Identification

• Males possess glossy blue-black heads and upper parts, with black throats and chests contrasting against white underparts, while females have similar markings but with a gray nape, back, and rump. Both sexes feature the eponymous red bill, whereas juveniles have a black bill and head with a mottled black and white back.
• The species measures 17 to 18 cm in length and weighs between 24 and 42 g.
• Its song is described as a complex, semi-musical but jumbled series, and flocks produce a call transcribed as "ééé-ééh...ééé-ééé-ééh...ééé-ééh-yuu...".

Habitat

Found in the upper Amazon Basin ranging from eastern and southeastern Peru and northern Bolivia east to central Brazil and north into the Guianas, including French Guiana, Guyana, and Suriname. It inhabits the canopy and emergent trees of humid terra firme forest up to approximately 900 m elevation, and is occasionally present on forest edges.

Diet

The diet consists of berries, seeds, beetles, and Cecropia catkins. Foraging typically occurs in groups of three to eight individuals that may join mixed-species feeding flocks, moving by hopping between branches and occasionally sallying out for flying prey.

Did you know?

The species has been the subject of significant taxonomic debate, spending over two centuries classified as a "true" tanager in the family Thraupidae before a 2013 publication proposed its reclassification to the new family Mitrospingidae, which was accepted by the International Ornithological Committee in 2018.