The typical honeycreepers form a genus ''Cyanerpes'' of small birds in the tanager family
Thraupidae. They are found in the tropical
New World from Mexico south to Brazil. They occur in the
forest canopy, and, as the name implies, they are specialist
nectar
Nectar is a sugar-rich liquid produced by plants in glands called nectaries or nectarines, either within the flowers with which it attracts pollinating animals, or by extrafloral nectaries, which provide a nutrient source to animal mutualists ...
feeders with long curved
bills.
The four ''Cyanerpes'' species have colourful legs, long wings and a short tail. The males are typically glossy purple-blue and the females greenish.
Taxonomy and species list
The genus ''Cyanerpes'' was introduced in 1899 by the American ornithologist
Harry C. Oberholser with the
red-legged honeycreeper as the
type species. The name combines the
Ancient Greek ''kuanos'' meaning "dark-blue" and ''herpēs'' meaning "creeper".
There are two other tanagers with honeycreeper in their common name: the
green honeycreeper
The green honeycreeper (''Chlorophanes spiza'') is a small bird in the tanager family. It is found in the tropical New World from southern Mexico south to Brazil, and on Trinidad. It is the only member of the genus ''Chlorophanes''.
Taxo ...
in the
monospecific genus ''Chlorophanes'' and the
golden-collared honeycreeper
The golden-collared honeycreeper (''Iridophanes pulcherrimus'') is an uncommon species of Neotropical bird in the tanager family Thraupidae. It is the only member of the genus ''Iridophanes''.
It is found in Colombia, Ecuador, and Peru. Its natu ...
in the monospecific genus ''Iridophanes''.
[ These two species are sister taxa and belong to the ]subfamily
In biological classification, a subfamily (Latin: ', plural ') is an auxiliary (intermediate) taxonomic rank, next below family but more inclusive than genus. Standard nomenclature rules end subfamily botanical names with "-oideae", and zoologi ...
Hemithraupinae rather than to Dacninae with the members of ''Cyanerpes''.
The genus contains four species:
Eggs
A commonly repeated, yet false, belief about the various honeycreeper species is that some of them lay black eggs. This idea was first made known in the scientific community with the 1899 publication of Nehrkorn's egg catalog; Nehrkorn's claim was cited in ornithological literature for many years without verification, but by the 1940s it was established that none of the members of ''Cyanerpes'' lay such eggs.
References
External links
Honeycreeper videos, photos and sounds
on the Internet Bird Collection
{{Authority control
Taxa named by Harry C. Oberholser