Return of Bird of the Week: Silvery-backed Tanager
Silver-Backed Tanager, Ollyatantambo, Peru
Another spectacular tanager, the Silver-backed Tanager, feeding on a berry on the grounds of the hotel where were staying. It’s also called a Silvery Tanager, but that seems less descriptive to WC. Officially it’s Tangara viridicollis, the same genus as last week’s Saffron-crowned Tanager. But that’s no particular distinction, there are fifty-some species in the genus Tangara, most of them ridiculously spectacularly colorful.
But unlike most Tangara species, the Silver-backed Tanager is strongly dichromatic. The female is very different.
Silvery-backed Tanager Female, Ollyatantambo, Peru
(No, it’s not a very good photo; an extremely uncooperative subject. But good enough to illustrate the point.) Silvery-backed Tanagers are omnivorous, eating fruits, nuts and insects. There are probably three subspecies, but there is very little reported research on the species, so the systematics are mostly unknown. It’s found in southern Ecuador montane Peru and far northern Brazil.
Populations of this species are believed to be stable, but there’s almost no research, so that’s at best an educated guess. WC can add that in his limited experience, this species likes the understory and only appears on gloomy days, making photography a real challenge. The male was photographed at ISO10000 and is still very dark.
For more bird photographs, please visit Frozen Feather Images.