The brown-capped vireo (''Vireo leucophrys'') is a small

passerine A passerine () is any bird of the order Passeriformes (; from Latin 'sparrow' and '-shaped') which includes more than half of all bird species. Sometimes known as perching birds, passerines generally have an anisodactyl arrangement of their ...

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 ...

. It breeds in highlands from southern

Mexico Mexico, officially the United Mexican States, is a country in North America. It is the northernmost country in Latin America, and borders the United States to the north, and Guatemala and Belize to the southeast; while having maritime boundar ...

south to northwestern

Bolivia Bolivia, officially the Plurinational State of Bolivia, is a landlocked country located in central South America. The country features diverse geography, including vast Amazonian plains, tropical lowlands, mountains, the Gran Chaco Province, w ...

. It is sometimes considered to be conspecific with the similar

warbling vireo The warbling vireo (''Vireo gilvus'') is a small North American songbird. Its breeding habitat is open deciduous and mixed woods from Alaska to Mexico. It often nests in widely spaced trees, often cottonwood or aspen, along streams or rivers. ...

. The adult brown-capped vireo is 12–12.7 cm in length and weighs 12 g. It has olive-green upperparts and a brown crown. There is a brown line from the bill through the eyes, and a 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 ...

. The face and throat are off-white, and the underparts are otherwise yellow with some olive on the flanks. Young birds are buff-brown above with a weaker supercilium. The brown-capped vireo has a sharp call and the song is a rich warbled ''here you see me hear me sing so sweet'', reminiscent of that of the

. This vireo occurs in the canopy and middle levels of light woodland, the edges of forest, and other semi-open habitats at altitudes from 500 to 2500 m.Hilty (2003), Strewe & Navarro (2004) Brown-capped vireos feed on

caterpillar Caterpillars ( ) are the larval stage of members of the order Lepidoptera (the insect order comprising butterflies and moths). As with most common names, the application of the word is arbitrary, since the larvae of sawflies (suborder ...

s and other

insect Insects (from Latin ') are Hexapoda, hexapod invertebrates of the class (biology), class Insecta. They are the largest group within the arthropod phylum. Insects have a chitinous exoskeleton, a three-part body (Insect morphology#Head, head, ...

s gleaned from tree foliage. They also eat small fruits. They will join

mixed-species feeding flock A mixed-species feeding flock, also termed a mixed-species foraging flock, mixed hunting party or informally bird wave, is a flock of usually insectivorous birds of different species that join each other and move together while foraging. These ar ...

s. The nest is undescribed.

Footnotes

References

* Hilty, Steven L. (2003): ''Birds of Venezuela''.

Christopher Helm Christopher Alexander Roger Helm (born Dundee, 1 February 1937 – 20 January 2007) was a Scottish book publisher, notably of ornithology related titles, including the ''Helm Identification Guides''. Born in Dundee, he was raised in Forfar, wh ...

, London. * Stiles, F. Gary & Skutch, Alexander Frank (1989): ''A guide to the birds of Costa Rica''. Comistock, Ithaca. * Strewe, Ralf & Navarro, Cristobal (2004): New and noteworthy records of birds from the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta region, north-eastern Colombia. '' Bull. B.O.C.'' 124(1): 38–51
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{{Taxonbar, from=Q2667703 brown-capped vireo Meso-American montane bird species Birds of the Northern Andes brown-capped vireo Taxa named by Frédéric de Lafresnaye