All species › Passerines › Shrike-babblers, Erpornis and vireos › Golden Vireo
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Golden Vireo | Vireo hypochryseus
Goudbuikvireo | Vireo dorado
The Golden Vireo is a vireo with bright yellow underparts and a yellow supercilium, found only in western Mexico. It lives in dry forest, thorn scrub and riverside vegetation on the Pacific slope.
Voice
Sings short, clear phrases from dense cover. The call is a nasal, scolding sound, as in other vireos.
Recording: Manuel Grosselet — CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 · converted to mono · xeno-canto
Identification
13 cm. Upperparts olive-green. Broad, bright yellow supercilium above a dark eye-stripe. Underparts entirely bright yellow, washed olive on the flanks. No wing bars. Eye dark. Bill fairly stout and greyish.
Confusion species
Yellow-green Vireo Vireo flavoviridis has a grey crown, a whitish supercilium and a white throat and belly; only the flanks and undertail coverts are yellow. Yellow warblers have a thinner, more pointed bill.
Habitat
Tropical dry forest, thorn scrub, gallery forest along rivers and streams, and forest edges, from the lowlands up into the lower slopes. It searches for insects in dense shrubs and low trees.
Where the bird is most at home, classified by the vegetation units of Mexico and Central America.
Range and movements
Endemic to western Mexico: the Pacific slope from southern Sonora to Oaxaca, and the Islas Marías. Does not occur outside the guide area.
- Resident
- dark = core range, pale = thinly spread
How and when to look
Often heard first in dry forest and scrub in western Mexico, for example in Nayarit, Jalisco and Colima. It usually stays in dense cover.
Conservation status
Not threatened. Fairly common in dry forest and scrub, but its range is limited to western Mexico.
Scientific name
Vireo hypochryseus | Sclater, 1863
Sclater described the species in 1863 and placed it straight away in the genus where it still stands. The genus Vireo was introduced in 1808 by Vieillot. Vireo was used by Latin authors for a small, green, migratory bird, probably the Eurasian golden oriole, though the European greenfinch has also been suggested. hypochryseus is Greek, from hupo 'below' and khruseos 'golden', after the golden-yellow underparts. The specimen the first description was based on came from Mexico (not specified further).