Crested Drongo

About the Crested Drongo

The crested drongo (Dicrurus forficatus) is a passerine bird in the family Dicruridae. It is black with a bluish-green sheen, a distinctive crest on the forehead and a forked tail. There are two subspecies; D. f. forficatus is endemic to Madagascar and D. f. potior, which is larger, is found on the Comoro Islands. Its habitat is lowland forests, both dry and humid, and open savannah country. It is a common bird and the IUCN has listed it as "least concern".

In 1760 the French zoologist Mathurin Jacques Brisson included a description of the crested drongo in his Ornithologie based on a specimen collected in Madagascar. He used the French name Le grand gobe-mouche noir hupé de Madagascar and the Latin Muscicapa Madagascariensis nigra major cristata. Although Brisson coined Latin names, these do not conform to the binomial system and are not recognised by the International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature. When in 1766 the Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus updated his Systema Naturae for the twelfth edition, he added 240 species that had been previously described by Brisson. One of these was the crested drongo. Linnaeus included a brief description, coined the binomial... Wikipedia →