Vorstman's Guideto the birds of the Caribbean

All species › Passerines › Tyrant flycatchers

Tyrant flycatchers | Tyrannidae

Tirannen | Tiránidos

With 66 species, tyrant flycatchers are the largest songbird family in the region. The bill is usually flat and broad, and many species hunt flying insects from a fixed lookout perch, catching them in a short sally; elaenias also eat much fruit. The plumage is often grey, olive, brown or yellow. On the islands the main groups are the kingbirds, such as Grey Kingbird, common almost everywhere, and Loggerhead Kingbird of the Greater Antilles and the Bahamas; the Myiarchus flycatchers, with several island endemics such as Puerto Rican and La Sagra's Flycatchers; Caribbean Elaenia; and the pewees of the genus Contopus, such as Cuban Pewee. During migration and in winter North American species such as Empidonax flycatchers are added. Trinidad and Tobago also hold South American forest species, from tiny tody-flycatchers to the large Great Kiskadee. Song is not learned and is fixed for each species; it is often the best character for similar species. Most build an open cup; Myiarchus nests in cavities.

Native species 62 species

Species that occur here by nature: breeding birds, winter visitors and passage migrants. They are arranged by genus, in the sequence of the list.

Platyrinchus 1 species

Leptopogon 1 species

Mionectes 2 species

Tolmomyias 2 species

Todirostrum 1 species

Myiornis 1 species

Camptostoma 1 species

Myiopagis 2 species

Elaenia 6 species

Nesotriccus 1 species

Myiarchus 11 species

Legatus 1 species

Attila 1 species

Machetornis 1 species

Pitangus 1 species

Myiodynastes 1 species

Tyrannopsis 1 species

Megarynchus 1 species

Empidonomus 1 species

Tyrannus 6 species

Myiophobus 1 species

Sublegatus 1 species

Arundinicola 1 species

Fluvicola 1 species

Cnemotriccus 1 species

Lathrotriccus 1 species

Sayornis 1 species

Empidonax 4 species

Contopus 8 species

Vagrants 4 species

Birds blown in from other continents. They have no range here, and so no distribution map.