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Black-striped Sparrow | Arremonops conirostris
Zwartstreepgors | Cerquero negrilistado
The Black-striped Sparrow is a large, olive-green sparrow with a grey head boldly striped with black that lives on the ground in scrub, forest edges and gardens. In the guide area it occurs from eastern Honduras to Panama; its range extends into northern South America.
Voice
The song is a series of clear whistled notes that starts slowly and then speeds up, roughly chew, chew, chew-chew-chewchewchew. There is also a short whistled how-why and a dry chip call.
Recording: Randall Jiménez Borbón — CC BY-NC 4.0 · shortened to the first 60 s, mono · xeno-canto
Identification
15–17 cm. Upperparts olive-green, wings and tail slightly greener. Head grey with two broad black crown stripes and a black eye-stripe. Throat whitish, breast and flanks grey, centre of belly white. A small yellow patch at the bend of the wing. Bill fairly heavy, upper mandible dark, lower mandible greyish. The sexes are alike; juveniles are browner, with less distinct head stripes and a faintly streaked breast.
Confusion species
Green-backed Sparrow Arremonops chloronotus (southern Yucatán Peninsula to northern Honduras) is smaller, with a brighter green back and a whiter belly. Orange-billed Sparrow Arremon aurantiirostris has a black head with a white supercilium, a black breast band and an orange bill. Chestnut-capped Brushfinch Arremon brunneinucha has a chestnut crown and a white throat with a black band below it and lives in montane forest.
Habitat
Scrub, overgrown pastures and fields, edges of humid forest, plantations, hedgerows and gardens in the lowlands and foothills, locally up to about 1500 m. It avoids closed forest. It forages on the ground for insects and seeds and sings from a low, often hidden perch.
Where the bird is most at home, classified by the vegetation units of Mexico and Central America.
Range and movements
In the guide area on the Caribbean slope from eastern Honduras and Nicaragua to Costa Rica, on the Pacific slope of south-western Costa Rica, and on both slopes in Panama. Outside the guide area in Colombia, Venezuela, western Ecuador and northern Brazil.
- Resident
- dark = core range, pale = thinly spread
How and when to look
Common in gardens and along overgrown roadsides; best found by listening for the accelerating whistled song, which is often heard throughout the day.
Conservation status
Not threatened (LC). Common, and it benefits from deforestation because it uses scrub and secondary growth.
Scientific name
Arremonops conirostris | (Bonaparte, 1850)
Bonaparte described the species in 1850 as Arremon conirostris; because it was later moved to another genus, the author and year stand in brackets. The genus Arremonops was introduced in 1896 by Ridgway. Arremonops is formed from the genus Arremon and Greek ōps 'appearance': 'resembling Arremon', as Ridgway considered it closely related. conirostris is Latin, from conus 'cone' and -rostris '-billed', after the stout conical bill. The specimen the first description was based on came from Colombia (originally given in error as 'Brazil').