Plain-mantled Tit-Spinetail

About the Plain-mantled Tit-Spinetail

The plain-mantled tit-spinetail (Leptasthenura aegithaloides) is a small passerine bird of South America in the Furnariinae subfamily of the ovenbird family Furnariidae. It is found in Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, and Peru.

The plain-mantled tit-spinetail's taxonomy is unsettled. The South American Classification Committee of the American Ornithological Society, the International Ornithological Committee, and the Clements taxonomy assign it these four subspecies:

L. a. grisescens Hellmayr, 1925 L. a. berlepschi Hartert, EJO, 1909 L. a. aegithaloides (Kittlitz, 1830) L. a. pallida Dabbene, 1920 However, BirdLife International's Handbook of the Birds of the World (HBW) treats L. a. berlepschi as the separate species "buffy tit-spinetail" and L. a. pallida as another separate species, the "pallid tit-spinetail". It retains "plain-mantled tit-spinetail" for L. a. aegithaloides plus L. a. grisescens.

This article follows the one-species, four-subspecies model. The plain-mantled tit-spinetail is 15 to 17 cm (5.9 to 6.7 in) long and weighs 7.5 to 11 g (0.26 to 0.39 oz). It is a small, slender, long-tailed furnariid with a short bill. The sexes... Wikipedia →