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Hooded mountain tanager facts for kids

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Hooded mountain tanager
Hooded mountain tanager (Buthraupis montana cucullata) Caldas.jpg
Buthraupis montana cucullata, Colombia
Conservation status
Scientific classification
Genus:
Buthraupis
Species:
montana
Buthraupis montana distribution map.png
Hooded mountain tanager range map
Buthraupis montana Hooded Mountain Tanager, Puno, Peru (cropped)
In Peru

The hooded mountain tanager (Buthraupis montana) is a species of bird in the tanager family Thraupidae. It is the only member of the genus Buthraupis. This yellow, blue and black tanager is found in forest, woodland and shrub in the Andean highlands of Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, and Venezuela. At 23 centimetres (9.1 in) and 85 grams (3.0 oz), it is one of the largest tanagers (second in weight only to the white-capped tanager).

Taxonomy

The hooded mountain tanager was formally described in 1837 by the French naturalists Alcide d'Orbigny and Frédéric de Lafresnaye from a specimen collected in the Bolivian Yungas. They coined the binomial name Aglaia montana.

It is now the only species placed in the genus Buthraupis that was introduced in 1851 by the German ornithologist Jean Cabanis.

The genus name combines the Ancient Greek bou- meaning "huge" and thraupis an unknown small bird but used by ornithologists to signify a tanager. The specific name is from the Latin montanus meaning "of the mountains".

Six subspecies are recognised:

  • Buthraupis montana venezuelana Aveledo & Perez, 1989 – northwest Venezuela
  • Buthraupis montana gigas (Bonaparte, 1851) – north Colombia
  • Buthraupis montana cucullata (Jardine & Selby, 1842) – west, central Colombia to Ecuador
  • Buthraupis montana cyanonota Berlepsch & Stolzmann, 1896 – north, central Peru
  • Buthraupis montana saturata Berlepsch & Stolzmann, 1906 – southeast Peru
  • Buthraupis montana montana (d'Orbigny & Lafresnaye, 1837) – west Bolivia
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