- Lanio leucothorax
Identification
Male mostly yellow with black on head, wings, and tail. Female brown with pale throat and otherwise showing a shadow of the male pattern (darker where the male is black, paler where it is yellow).
Variation: male in the Caribbean parts of Costa Rica as described, but shows black rump and undertail coverts in the Pacific lowlands.
Distribution
Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama.
Uncommon to fairly common in its range.
Taxonomy
Four subspecies are recognized:
- L. l. leucothorax from extreme eastern Honduras to eastern Nicaragua and eastern Costa Rica
- L. l. reversus in northwest Costa Rica
- L. l. melanopygius in southwest Costa Rica and on the Pacific slope of western Panama
- L. l. ictus in extreme northwest Panama
Has in the past been considered conspecific with Black-throated Shrike-Tanager and may form a superspecies with it.
Habitat
Moist lowland forests in the Pacific, more likely to frequent foothills on the Caribbean side.
Occurs from lowlands up to 900m.
Behaviour
Feeds on arthropods and occasionally fruit.
A noisy and active species, usually seen in pairs or families and in mixed-species flocks.
Breeding recorded in May. One nest was placed in a low bush and contained 2 eggs.
A resident species.
References
- Clements, J. F., T. S. Schulenberg, M. J. Iliff, B.L. Sullivan, C. L. Wood, and D. Roberson. 2012. The eBird/Clements Checklist of Birds of the World. 6th ed., with updates to October 2012. Ithaca: Cornell Univ. Press. ISBN 978-0801445019. Spreadsheet available at http://www.birds.cornell.edu/clementschecklist/downloadable-clements-checklist
- Garrigues and Dean 2007. The birds of Costa Rica - a field guide. Cornell University Press. ISBN 978-0-8014-7373-9
- Del Hoyo, J, A Elliott, and D Christie, eds. 2011. Handbook of the Birds of the World. Volume 16: Tanagers to New World Blackbirds. Barcelona: Lynx Edicions. ISBN 978-8496553781
Recommended Citation
- BirdForum Opus contributors. (2024) White-throated Shrike-Tanager. In: BirdForum, the forum for wild birds and birding. Retrieved 5 May 2024 from https://www.birdforum.net/opus/White-throated_Shrike-Tanager
