The Bahama mockingbird (''Mimus gundlachii'') 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 Mimidae. It is found in the

Bahamas The Bahamas, officially the Commonwealth of The Bahamas, is an archipelagic and island country within the Lucayan Archipelago of the Atlantic Ocean. It contains 97 per cent of the archipelago's land area and 88 per cent of its population. ...

Cuba Cuba, officially the Republic of Cuba, is an island country, comprising the island of Cuba (largest island), Isla de la Juventud, and List of islands of Cuba, 4,195 islands, islets and cays surrounding the main island. It is located where the ...

Jamaica Jamaica is an island country in the Caribbean Sea and the West Indies. At , it is the third-largest island—after Cuba and Hispaniola—of the Greater Antilles and the Caribbean. Jamaica lies about south of Cuba, west of Hispaniola (the is ...

and the

Turks and Caicos Islands The Turks and Caicos Islands (abbreviated TCI; and ) are a British Overseas Territory consisting of the larger Caicos Islands and smaller Turks Islands, two groups of tropical islands in the Lucayan Archipelago of the Atlantic Ocean and no ...

, and is a

vagrant Vagrancy is the condition of wandering homelessness without regular employment or income. Vagrants usually live in poverty and support themselves by travelling while engaging in begging, scavenging, or petty theft. In Western countries, ...

Florida Florida ( ; ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders the Gulf of Mexico to the west, Alabama to the northwest, Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia to the north, the Atlantic ...

Taxonomy and systematics

The Bahama mockingbird has two subspecies, the nominate ''Mimus gundlachii gundlachii'' and ''M. g. hillii''. Its specific epithet honors

Juan Gundlach Juan Cristóbal Gundlach (July 17, 1810 - March 14, 1896) was a German-Cuban naturalist and taxonomist. Biography Gundlach graduated from Marburg University, where his father was professor of physics, as Doctor of Philosophy in 1837. In 1839, h ...

.Cody, M. L. (2020). Bahama Mockingbird (''Mimus gundlachii''), 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.bahmoc.01 retrieved July 20, 2021

Description

The Bahama mockingbird is long and weighs between with an average of . Adults of the nominate subspecies have a mottled face with a pale

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 ...

. Their upperparts are brownish gray with dark streaks from the crown to the lower back. Their outer tail feathers have whitish tips. Their underparts are light gray with light streaking on the upper breast and more prominent streaks on the flanks. The juvenile is similar but has more densely spotted underparts. ''M. g. hillii'' has more prominent streaking on its back than the nominate and the white tips on the tail feathers are larger.

Distribution and habitat

The nominate subspecies of Bahama mockingbird is found in the Bahamas, the Turks and Caicos Islands, and the Sabana-Camagüey Archipelago off Cuba's north coast. ''M. g. hillii'' is found only in southern Jamaica. Except in Jamaica, the Bahama mockingbird inhabits a variety of biomes including coastal strand, semi-arid scrub, open woodland, and plantations. In Jamaica it inhabits dry scrubby woodland on limestone hills. It appears to favor taller, denser vegetation than the similar

northern mockingbird The northern mockingbird (''Mimus polyglottos'') is a mockingbird commonly found in North America, of the family Mimidae. The species is also found in some parts of the Caribbean, as well as on the Hawaiian Islands. It is typically a permanent B ...

(''Mimus polyglottus'') where their ranges overlap.

Behavior

Feeding

The Bahama mockingbird is omnivorous; its diet includes invertebrates, nectar, small fruits, and little lizards. It mainly forages on the ground, searching through leaf litter, but also hunts up to high in vegetation. It aggressively defends feeding sites.

Breeding

The Bahama mockingbird's breeding season spans from February to July in most areas but from April on the Cuban islands. Both sexes build a rough open cup nest of twigs, lined with softer fibers, and usually placed low in a bush. They aggressively defend their territory with vigorous song. The clutch size is two or three.

Vocalization

The Bahama mockingbird's song is loud and repetitive, a "series of abrupt, varied notes and phrases, with repetition". It apparently does not mimic other birds' songs.

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 Bahama mockingbird as being of Least Concern. It is common in the Bahamas, in southern Jamaica, and on some of the Cuban cays. As human habitation spreads it might suffer from competition with the northern mockingbird.

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q2225329 Bahama Mockingbird Birds of the Bahamas Birds of Cuba Birds of Jamaica Birds of the Turks and Caicos Islands Bahama mockingbird Taxonomy articles created by Polbot