White-throated spadebill
species of bird
The white-throated spadebill (Platyrinchus mystaceus) is a tiny passerine bird in the family Tyrannidae, the tyrant flycatchers. It is found in Costa Rica, Panama, on Trinidad and Tobago, and in every mainland South American country except Chile, French Guiana, Uruguay, and Suriname.
Taxonomy and systematics
The white-throated spadebill's taxonomy has not been settled. The International Ornithological Committee (IOC), the Clements taxonomy, and the American Ornithological Society (AOS) assign it these 14 subspecies:
However, BirdLife International's Handbook of the Birds of the World (HBW) treats the first five subspecies as the "western white-throated spadebill" (P. albogularis) and the other nine as the "eastern white-throated spadebill" (P. mystaceus). One author who advocates the two-species model calls them respectively the "white-throated" and "yellow-crested" spadebills. The Clements taxonomy and the AOS partition the subspecies as the albogularis and mystaceus groups within the species.
What is now the stub-tailed spadebill (P. cancrominus) was treated by several early twentieth century authors as another subspecies of P. mystaceus.
This article follows the one species, 14 subspecies, model, though the "western" and "eastern" groups are at times treated separately.
Description
The white-throated spadebill is about 9 to 11 cm (3.5 to 4.3 in) long and weighs 7.5 to 12 g (0.26 to 0.42 oz). It has a large head with a bold facial pattern and a stubby tail.
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