Yellow-fronted Canary

About the Yellow-fronted Canary

The yellow-fronted canary (Crithagra mozambica) is a small passerine bird in the finch family. It is sometimes known in aviculture as the green singing finch or the green singer. This bird is a resident breeder in Africa south of the Sahara Desert. Its habitat is open woodland and cultivation. It nests in trees, laying three or four eggs in a compact cup nest. It has been introduced to Mauritius, Rodrigues, Réunion, Assumption Island, Mafia Island, Puerto Rico, and the Hawaiian Islands, where it is found on western Hawaii, southeastern Oahu and Molokai.

The yellow-fronted canary is a common, gregarious seedeater. It is 11–13 cm in length. The adult male has a green back and brown wings and tail. The underparts and rump are yellow, and the head is yellow with a grey crown and nape and a black malar stripe. The female is similar, but with a weaker head pattern and duller underparts. Juveniles are greyer than the female, especially on the head.

Its song is a warbled zee-zeree-chereeo. The yellow-fronted canary was formerly placed in the genus Serinus, but phylogenetic analysis using mitochondrial and nuclear DNA sequences found the genus to be polyphyletic. The genus was... Wikipedia →