Blue-black Grassquit
Volatinia jacarina
Silhouette: Sheatherius · PhyloPic
- KingdomAnimalia (Animals)
- PhylumChordata (Chordates)
- ClassAves (Birds)
- OrderPasseriformes (Perching Birds)
- FamilyThraupidae (Tanagers and Allies)
- GenusVolatinia
- SpeciesVolatinia jacarina (Blue-black Grassquit)
About the Blue-black Grassquit
The blue-black grassquit (Volatinia jacarina) is a small Neotropical bird in the family Thraupidae, the tanagers and allies. It is found in Mexico, every Central American country, every mainland South American country, in Trinidad and Tobago, and in Grenada.
The blue-black grassquit was formally described by the Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus in 1766 in the twelfth edition of his Systema Naturae under the binomial name Tanagra jacarina. Linnaeus based his description on the "Jacarni" that was described in 1648 by the German naturalist Georg Marcgrave in his Historia Naturalis Brasiliae. The type locality is eastern Brazil. The specific epithet jacarina is derived from the Tupi language and was used for a type of finch. The blue-black grassquit is now the only species in the genus Volatinia that was introduced in 1850 by the German naturalist Ludwig Reichenbach. The genus name is a diminutive of the Latin volatus meaning "flying".
Within the tanager family Thraupidae the blue-black grassquit is in the subfamily Tachyphoninae and is a member of a clade that contains the genera Conothraupis and Creurgops. It was formerly placed with the buntings in the... Wikipedia →
Closest Relatives at Coiba National Park
Bananaquit
Coereba flaveola
Crimson-backed Tanager
Ramphocelus dimidiatus
Red-legged Honeycreeper
Cyanerpes cyaneus
Yellow-faced Grassquit
Tiaris olivaceus
Blue-gray Tanager
Thraupis episcopus
Streaked Saltator
Saltator striatipectus
Saffron Finch
Sicalis flaveola
Shining Honeycreeper
Cyanerpes lucidus
Variable Seedeater
Sporophila corvina
Palm Tanager
Thraupis palmarum
Buff-throated Saltator
Saltator maximus
Thick-billed Seed-Finch
Sporophila funerea
Global Distribution
Warmer areas are where this animal is recorded most often.