Tropical kingbird

The tropical kingbird (Tyrannus melancholicus) is a large tyrant flycatcher. This bird breeds from southern Arizona and the lower Rio Grande Valley of Texas in the United States through Central America, South America as far as south as central Argentina and eastern Peru, and on Trinidad and Tobago. Birds from the northernmost and southern breeding areas migrate to warmer parts of the range after breeding.

Taxonomy

The tropical kingbird was formally described in 1819 by the French ornithologist Louis Pierre Vieillot under the binomial name Tyrannus melancholicus.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> Vieillot based his description on the Suirirí-Guazú that had been described by the Spanish naturalist Félix de Azara in 1805 in his book Apuntamientos para la historia natural de los páxaros del Paragüay y Rio de la Plata.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref><ref>Template:Cite book</ref> The specific epithet is Latin meaning "melancholic" (that is "bad-tempered").<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>

Three subspecies are recognised:<ref name=ioc>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

• T. m. satrapa (Cabanis & Heine, 1860) – southwest USA to north Colombia, north Venezuela and Trinidad
• T. m. despotes (Lichtenstein, MHK, 1823) – northeast Brazil
• T. m. melancholicus Vieillot, 1819 – north South America to central Argentina

Description

An adult tropical kingbird is Template:Convert long, weighs Template:Convert and has a wingspan range of 38–41 cm.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> The head is pale gray, with a darker eye mask, an orange crown stripe, and a heavy gray bill. The back is grayish-green, and the wing and forked tail are brown. The throat is pale gray, becoming olive on the breast, with the rest of the underparts being yellow. The sexes are similar, but young birds have pale buff edges on the wing coverts.

Behaviour and ecology

Breeding

Tropical kingbirds appear to be monogamous. In most parts of the species' range, they are permanent residents and remain together in pairs year-round.Template:HarvTemplate:Page needed The call is a high-pitched twittering trill, tree-e-e-e-e-e-e, with a more complex version sung by the male at dawn.

Their breeding habitat is semi-open areas with trees and shrubs, including gardens and roadsides. Tropical kingbirds like to observe their surroundings from a prominent open perch, usually high in a tree, undertaking long flights to acrobatically catch insects in mid-air (hawking), sometimes hovering to pick food off vegetation (gleaning).<ref>de A. Gabriel, Vagner & Pizo, Marco A. (2005): Foraging behavior of tyrant flycatchers (Aves, Tyrannidae) in Brazil. Revista Brasileira de Zoologia 22 (4): 1072–1077 [English with Portuguese abstract]. {{#invoke:doi|main}} PDF fulltext</ref><ref name="Pascotto">Pascotto, Márcia Cristina (2006): Avifauna dispersora de sementes de Alchornea glandulosa (Euphorbiaceae) em uma área de mata ciliar no estado de São Paulo [Seed dispersal of Alchornea glandulosa (Euphorbiaceae) by birds in a gallery forest in São Paulo, southeastern Brazil.]. Revista Brasileira de Ornitologia 14 (3): 291–296 [Portuguese with English abstract]. PDF fulltext Template:Webarchive</ref> The insects preyed upon include beetles, bees, wasps, termites, butterflies, moths, dragonflies and grasshoppers.<ref name="auto">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref name="auto1">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> They also eat some berries and fruit from such diverse species as tamanqueiro (Alchornea glandulosa), common guava (Psidium guajava), the Annonaceae, Cymbopetalum mayanum and gumbo-limbo (Bursera simaruba);<ref name="Pascotto"/><ref name="auto"/><ref>Foster, Mercedes S. (2007): The potential of fruiting trees to enhance converted habitats for migrating birds in southern Mexico. Bird Conservation International 17 (1): 45–61. {{#invoke:doi|main}}</ref> foraging for these even in disturbed habitat. As they keep mainly to the upper levels of trees, they find little profit in following mixed-species feeding flocks in the understory.<ref>Machado, C. G. (1999): A composição dos bandos mistos de aves na Mata Atlântica da Serra de Paranapiacaba, no sudeste brasileiro [Mixed flocks of birds in Atlantic Rain Forest in Serra de Paranapiacaba, southeastern Brazil]. Revista Brasileira de Biologia 59 (1): 75–85 [Portuguese with English abstract]. {{#invoke:doi|main}} PDF fulltext</ref>

Aplomado falcons have been known to prey on adult tropical kingbirds, while eggs and young have been attacked by swallow-tailed kites and chestnut-mandibled toucans.<ref name="auto1"/><ref name="auto"/> These birds aggressively defend their territory against intruders, even much larger birds such as magnificent frigatebirds, toucans, caracaras or hawks. In a study in Parque Nacional de La Macarena of Colombia, parasitism by microfilariae and trypanosomas (presumably T. everetti) was infrequently recorded in tropical kingbirds.<ref>Basto, Natalia; Rodríguez, Oscar A.; Marinkelle, Cornelis J.; Gutierrez, Rafael & Matta, Nubia Estela (2006): Haematozoa in birds from la Macarena National Natural Park (Colombia). Caldasia 28 (2): 371–377 [English with Spanish abstract]. PDF fulltext</ref>

The male and female inspect potential sites together before selecting a site, typically a fork or crotch high in a tree (up to Template:Convert high) but sometimes just a few metres above water.Template:HarvTemplate:Page needed The female builds a bulky, sloppy-looking, shallow nest of vines, rootlets, twigs, weeds, and grasses; it is unlined or lined with hair. Nests average about Template:Convert across and Template:Convert tall, with interior cup about Template:Convert across and Template:Convert deep.Template:SfnTemplate:Page needed

The female incubates the typical clutch of two to four eggs for approximately 16 days, and the nestlings fledge in another 18 or 19 days. The eggs are whitish or pale pink with variable amounts of dark blotching.Template:SfnTemplate:Page needed

Status

The tropical kingbird is one of the most widespread and conspicuous inhabitants of open forest, forest edge, scrub and agricultural land from the southwestern United States south to Argentina (Jahn, Stouffer, & Chesser, 2013). As a result, the bird is considered as being of Least Concern and their population is increasing, according to the IUCN.<ref name="iucn status 19 November 2021" /> According to Partners in Flight, global estimates of tropical kingbird breeding population is around 200 million. They rate the species as 4 out of 20 on the continental concern scale, indicating that this species is of low conservation concern.Template:Sfn

Gallery

• Tropical kingbird (Tyrannus melancholicus) in flight Rio Napo.jpg

  T. m. melancholicus
  Ecuador

• Tyrannus-melancholicus-001.jpg

  T. m. satrapa
  Panama

• Tropical kingbird (Tyrannus melancholicus satrapa).jpg

  T. m. satrapa
  Panama

• Dstonek 17035.jpg

  feeding young

• Tropical kingbird in the rain (60130).jpg

  in the rain in Costa Rica

References

General sources

• Template:Cite journal
• Template:Cite book
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Further reading

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External links

• Template:InternetBirdCollection
• Template:VIREO
• Template:NeotropicalBirds
• Template:IUCN Map
• IUCN. (2019). Tropical Kingbird. Retrieved from: [1]
• Nesting Tyrannus melancholicus