The bicolored wren (''Campylorhynchus griseus'') is a species of

bird Birds are a group of warm-blooded vertebrates constituting the class (biology), class Aves (), characterised by feathers, toothless beaked jaws, the Oviparity, laying of Eggshell, hard-shelled eggs, a high Metabolism, metabolic rate, a fou ...

in the family Troglodytidae. It is found in

Colombia Colombia, officially the Republic of Colombia, is a country primarily located in South America with Insular region of Colombia, insular regions in North America. The Colombian mainland is bordered by the Caribbean Sea to the north, Venezuel ...

Venezuela Venezuela, officially the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, is a country on the northern coast of South America, consisting of a continental landmass and many Federal Dependencies of Venezuela, islands and islets in the Caribbean Sea. It com ...

Guyana Guyana, officially the Co-operative Republic of Guyana, is a country on the northern coast of South America, part of the historic British West Indies. entry "Guyana" Georgetown, Guyana, Georgetown is the capital of Guyana and is also the co ...

, and

Brazil Brazil, officially the Federative Republic of Brazil, is the largest country in South America. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by area, fifth-largest country by area and the List of countries and dependencies by population ...

Taxonomy and systematics

The bicolored wren has six subspecies: *''C. g. albicilius'' Bonaparte (1854) *''C. g. bicolor'' Pelzeln (1875) *''C. g. griseus'' Swainson (1837) *''C. g. minor''

Cabanis Cabanis is a surname. Notable people with the surname include: * Bernard Cabanis (born 1950), French ice hockey player * George Cabanis (1815–1892), American politician * James Cabanis (1838–1920), American politician, son of George Cabanis *Jea ...

(1851) *''C. g. pallidus'' Phelps & Phelps Jr. (1947) *''C. g. zimmeri'' Borrero & Hernandez-Camacho (1958) It has sometimes been treated as

conspecific Biological specificity is the tendency of a characteristic such as a behavior or a biochemical variation to occur in a particular species. Biochemist Linus Pauling stated that "Biological specificity is the set of characteristics of living organism ...

with the giant wren (''Campylorhynchus chiapensis'') and might form a superspecies with it.Remsen, J. V., Jr., J. I. Areta, E. Bonaccorso, S. Claramunt, A. Jaramillo, D. F. Lane, J. F. Pacheco, M. B. Robbins, F. G. Stiles, and K. J. Zimmer. Version 23 May 2021. A classification of the bird species of South America. American Ornithological Society. https://www.museum.lsu.edu/~Remsen/SACCBaseline.htm retrieved May 24, 2021 Subspecies ''C. g. zimmeri'' has been considered to be an intergrade between ''albicius'' and the nominate ''griseus''.Kroodsma, D. E. and D. Brewer (2020). Bicolored Wren (''Campylorhynchus griseus''), version 1.0. In Birds of the World (J. del Hoyo, A. Elliott, J. Sargatal, D. A. Christie, and E. de Juana, Editors). Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Ithaca, NY, USA. https://doi.org/10.2173/bow.bicwre1.01 retrieved May 31, 2021

Description

The bicolored wren is the largest

South America South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a considerably smaller portion in the Northern Hemisphere. It can also be described as the southern Subregion#Americas, subregion o ...

n wren and second in size only to the giant wren overall in the family. It is long and weighs . The sexes are similar. The nominate adults have dark chocolate crowns and napes and their upperparts a paler chocolate. An off-white

supercilium The supercilium is a plumage feature found on the heads of some bird species. It is a stripe which runs from the base of the bird's beak above its eye, finishing somewhere towards the rear of the bird's head.Dunn and Alderfer (2006), p. 10 Also k ...

separates a dark brown stripe through the eye from the crown and the rest of the face is also white. Their tail is dark brown; all of the tail feathers except the middle pair have a white band near the end. The throat and the entire underparts are white. ''C. g. albicilius'' is rustier than the nominate; so is ''bicolor'' but its rump is lighter. ''C. g. minor'' is smaller and its nape and upper back are blackish brown. ''C. g. pallidus'' is paler and more gray than the nominate and has a darker crown. The juveniles are grayer than the adults; their caps are mottled gray-brown and their underparts are grayish white.

Distribution and habitat

The subspecies of bicolored wren are distributed thus: *''C. g. albicilius'', northern Colombia and northwestern Venezuela with a few records in far eastern Panama *''C. g. bicolor'', western Colombia's upper

Magdalena Valley The Magdalena River (, ; less commonly ) is the main river of Colombia, flowing northward about through the western half of the country. It takes its name from the biblical figure Mary Magdalene. It is navigable through much of its lower reaches, ...

and west slope of the Eastern Andes *''C. g. griseus'', eastern Venezuela through western and southwestern Guyana into extreme northern Brazil *''C. g. minor'', northern Venezuela and eastern Colombia *''C. g. pallidus'', southern Venezuela's Amazonas State *''C. g. zimmeri'', central Colombia's Huila and

Tolima Department Tolima () is one of the 32 departments of Colombia, located in the Andean region, in the center-west of the country. It is bordered on the north and the west by the department of Caldas; on the east by the department of Cundinamarca; on the ...

s The bicolored wren inhabits areas with scattered trees and bushes and is completely absent from forests and wide open areas. ''C. g. bicolor'' occurs in arid

thorn scrub Deserts and xeric shrublands are a biome defined by the World Wide Fund for Nature. Deserts and xeric (Ancient Greek 'dry') shrublands form the largest terrestrial biome, covering 19% of Earth's land surface area. Ecoregions in this habitat ...

and the other subspecies in significantly more humid areas. In elevation it ranges up to in Colombia and in Venezuela.

Behavior

Feeding

The bicolored wren forages in trees and on the ground. Its diet is primarily invertebrates, but it also eats vegetable matter such as berries.

Breeding

The bicolored wren has two breeding seasons in Venezuela, January to March and May to August; its season in Colombia has not been determined. It is a

cooperative breeder Cooperative breeding is a social system characterized by alloparental care: offspring receive care not only from their parents, but also from additional group members, often called helpers. Cooperative breeding encompasses a wide variety of group s ...

with blood relatives helping the nesting pair defend the nest and feed the young. The nest is a dome made of grass and other fibers and with a side entrance. It is placed high in a tree and is well concealed. The wren sometimes also uses old domed nests of other species. The clutch size is three to five.

Vocalization

The male bicolored wren's song is "a series of multiple loud gurgling notes

The female's is similar but includes a trill. The songs vary widely across the species' range. Its calls are "mostly harsh and grating

Status

The

IUCN The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) is an international organization working in the field of nature conservation and sustainable use of natural resources. Founded in 1948, IUCN has become the global authority on the status ...

has assessed the bicolored wren as being of Least Concern. It is "common or abundant nd cantolerate substantial modification of habitat, provided that sufficient bushes remain; for example, tcan co-exist with agricultural practices such as ranching.

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q790641 bicolored wren Birds of Colombia Birds of Venezuela Birds of the Guiana Shield bicolored wren Taxonomy articles created by Polbot Taxa named by William Swainson