Alternative name: Cape Crombec
- Sylvietta rufescens
Identification
Length 10-12 cm, mass 9-13 g. Tail very short; appears tailless in the field.
Upper parts brownish grey to blueish grey and underparts tawny cinnamon to cinnamon buff. The eyebrow is whitish to pale tawny, contrasting with a dark eye-stripe.
Distribution
Africa south of the equator: Western Angola, eastern DRC and western Tanzania south to South Africa.
Taxonomy
Subspecies[1]
Sylvietta rufescens has seven subspecies that differ mainly in the shades of grey and brown on their upper parts and shades of buff and rufous on their under parts:
- S. r. adelphe:
- S. r. ansorgei:
- Coastal Angola (Benguela to Luanda)
- S. r. flecki:
- S. r. pallida:
- South-eastern Zambia to Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Malawi and Transvaal
- S. r. rufescens:
- Southern Botswana to south-western Transvaal and western Cape Province
- S. r. diverga:
- Southern Transvaal to Orange Free State and eastern Cape Province
- S. r. resurga:
An additional subspecies ochrocara is generally considered invalid[2].
Habitat
Woodland, savanna, arid shrublands.
Behaviour
Diet
Forages restlessly in bushes and the lower canpoy of trees, mainly for invertebrates; also eats seeds, fruit and nectar. Often seen in mixed-species feeding flocks; its often-repeated prrrp contact call is probably key to keepng these parties together.
Breeding
Monogamous and territorial. The nest is a deep purse of plant fibres and spider web, built about a metre above the ground, and suspended from the end of a branch of a bush or small tree. One to three eggs are laid August to February; incubated for 14 days by both sexes.
References
- Clements, JF. 2009. The Clements Checklist of Birds of the World. 6th ed., with updates to December 2009. Ithaca: Cornell Univ. Press. ISBN 978-0801445019.
Recommended Citation
- BirdForum Opus contributors. (2024) Long-billed Crombec. In: BirdForum, the forum for wild birds and birding. Retrieved 19 March 2024 from https://www.birdforum.net/opus/Long-billed_Crombec
External Links
GSearch checked for 2020 platform.1