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Yucatan Flycatcher | Myiarchus yucatanensis
Yucatántiran | Papamoscas yucateco
The Yucatan Flycatcher is a medium-sized Myiarchus flycatcher found only on and around the Yucatán Peninsula. It closely resembles the widespread Dusky-capped Flycatcher, but has a less dark head and a paler face. It usually sits quietly at mid-levels in trees and is often first noticed by its plaintive whistle.
Voice
A long, plaintive, slowly rising whistle, sometimes broken into two parts. Also short, soft calls.
Recording: Mike Nelson — CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 · shortened to the first 60 s, mono · xeno-canto
Identification
18 cm. Upperparts greyish olive-brown; the crown is barely darker than the back. Lores and eye-ring pale greyish, giving the face a soft expression. Wings dark with pale edges to the coverts and flight feathers, the primaries narrowly edged rufous. Tail brown with little rufous. Throat and breast pale grey, belly pale yellow. Bill black. Male and female are alike.
Confusion species
Dusky-capped Flycatcher Myiarchus tuberculifer occurs in the same area, is slightly smaller and has a distinctly dark, blackish-brown cap contrasting with the olive back; its call is a falling rather than a rising whistle. Brown-crested Flycatcher Myiarchus tyrannulus is larger, with a heavier bill and more rufous in wings and tail. Great Crested Flycatcher Myiarchus crinitus (winter visitor) is larger, with a dark grey throat and breast and much rufous in the tail.
Habitat
Seasonal and semi-evergreen lowland forest, forest edges, mature secondary forest and scrub with taller trees. It forages mainly at mid-levels and in the lower canopy, sallying for insects from a perch or picking them from leaves; it also eats small fruits. It nests in a tree cavity.
Where the bird is most at home, classified by the vegetation units of Mexico and Central America.
Range and movements
Found only in the guide area: the Yucatán Peninsula in Mexico (Campeche, Yucatán and Quintana Roo), northern Belize and northern Guatemala (Petén).
- Resident
- dark = core range, pale = thinly spread
How and when to look
The whistle is the best feature. Where Dusky-capped Flycatcher also occurs, check the crown colour: in Yucatan Flycatcher it is barely darker than the back.
Conservation status
Not threatened. It has a small range, but within it is fairly common in forest and at forest edges.
Scientific name
Myiarchus yucatanensis | Lawrence, 1871
Lawrence described the species in 1871 and placed it straight away in the genus where it still stands. The genus Myiarchus was introduced in 1844 by Cabanis. Myiarchus is Greek, from muia 'fly' and arkhos 'ruler': 'fly-ruler'. yucatanensis refers to the Yucatán Peninsula in Mexico, where the species was discovered. The specimen the first description was based on came from Mérida, Yucatán, Mexico.