Wood pipit

Wood pipit
Not recognized (IUCN 3.1)
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Aves
Order: Passeriformes
Family: Motacillidae
Genus: Anthus
Species: A. nyassae
Binomial name
Anthus nyassae
Neumann, 1906

The Wood pipit or Woodland pipit (Anthus nyassae) is a small passerine bird belonging to the pipit genus Anthus in the family Motacillidae. It was formerly included in the Long-billed pipit (Anthus similis) but is now frequently treated as a separate species. It is a bird of miombo woodland in south-central Africa, unlike the Long-billed pipit which inhabits open grassland. It perches in trees when flushed but forages on the ground for invertebrates.

It is 16-18 centimetres long. The upperparts are warm brown with dark streaks while the underparts are pale with some streaking on the breast. The bird has a dark eyestripe, white supercilium and pale outer tail-feathers. Juveniles have dark spots above and have more streaking below than the adults. The bird's song is high-pitched and monotonous.

The Long-billed pipit is very similar but has a slightly longer bill and tail, a smaller pale area in the outer tail-feathers and a slightly lower voice.

The range of the Wood pipit extends from south-east Gabon eastwards to southern and western Tanzania and southwards as far as north-east Namibia, northern Botswana, Zimbabwe and north-west Mozambique. At least three subspecies are recognized: A. n. nyassae, A. n. frondicolus and A. n. schoutedeni. Some authors recognize a fourth subspecies, A. n. chersophilus.

References

Wikispecies has information related to: Anthus nyassae

External links

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the Sunday, April 10, 2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.