The chestnut-belted gnateater (''Conopophaga aurita'') is a species of

bird Birds are a group of warm-blooded vertebrates constituting the class Aves (), characterised by feathers, toothless beaked jaws, the laying of hard-shelled eggs, a high metabolic rate, a four-chambered heart, and a strong yet lightweigh ...

in the family Conopophagidae, the gnateaters. It is found in the

Amazon Basin The Amazon basin is the part of South America drained by the Amazon River and its tributaries. The Amazon drainage basin covers an area of about , or about 35.5 percent of the South American continent. It is located in the countries of Bolivi ...

of northern

Brazil Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area ...

, southern

Colombia Colombia (, ; ), officially the Republic of Colombia, is a country in South America with insular regions in North America—near Nicaragua's Caribbean coast—as well as in the Pacific Ocean. The Colombian mainland is bordered by the Car ...

and eastern

Peru , image_flag = Flag of Peru.svg , image_coat = Escudo nacional del Perú.svg , other_symbol = Great Seal of the State , other_symbol_type = Seal (emblem), National seal , national_motto = "Fi ...

and

Ecuador Ecuador ( ; ; Quechua: ''Ikwayur''; Shuar: ''Ecuador'' or ''Ekuatur''), officially the Republic of Ecuador ( es, República del Ecuador, which literally translates as "Republic of the Equator"; Quechua: ''Ikwadur Ripuwlika''; Shuar: ''Eku ...

; also the Guianan countries of

Guyana Guyana ( or ), officially the Cooperative Republic of Guyana, is a country on the northern mainland of South America. Guyana is an indigenous word which means "Land of Many Waters". The capital city is Georgetown. Guyana is bordered by the ...

Suriname Suriname (; srn, Sranankondre or ), officially the Republic of Suriname ( nl, Republiek Suriname , srn, Ripolik fu Sranan), is a country on the northeastern Atlantic coast of South America. It is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the north ...

and eastern

French Guiana French Guiana ( or ; french: link=no, Guyane ; gcr, label=French Guianese Creole, Lagwiyann ) is an overseas departments and regions of France, overseas department/region and single territorial collectivity of France on the northern Atlantic ...

. Its natural

habitat In ecology, the term habitat summarises the array of resources, physical and biotic factors that are present in an area, such as to support the survival and reproduction of a particular species. A species habitat can be seen as the physical ...

tropical moist lowland forest Tropical and subtropical moist broadleaf forests (TSMF), also known as tropical moist forest, is a subtropical and tropical forest habitat type defined by the World Wide Fund for Nature. Description TSMF is generally found in large, discont ...

Taxonomy

The chestnut-belted gnateater was formally described in 1789 by the German naturalist

Johann Friedrich Gmelin , fields = , workplaces = University of GöttingenUniversity of Tübingen , alma_mater = University of Tübingen , doctoral_advisor = Philipp Friedrich GmelinFerdinand Christoph Oetinger , academic_advisors = , doctora ...

in his revised and expanded edition of

Carl Linnaeus Carl Linnaeus (; 23 May 1707 – 10 January 1778), also known after his ennoblement in 1761 as Carl von Linné Blunt (2004), p. 171. (), was a Swedish botanist, zoologist, taxonomist, and physician who formalised binomial nomenclature, the ...

's ''

Systema Naturae ' (originally in Latin written ' with the ligature æ) is one of the major works of the Swedish botanist, zoologist and physician Carl Linnaeus (1707–1778) and introduced the Linnaean taxonomy. Although the system, now known as binomial nomen ...

''. He placed it with the thrushes in the

genus Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of extant taxon, living and fossil organisms as well as Virus classification#ICTV classification, viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus com ...

'' Turdus'' and coined the

binomial name In taxonomy, binomial nomenclature ("two-term naming system"), also called nomenclature ("two-name naming system") or binary nomenclature, is a formal system of naming species of living things by giving each a name composed of two parts, bot ...

''Turdus auritus''. Gmelin based his description on "Le fourmilier à oreilles blanches" that had been described and illustrated in 1778 by French polymath

Comte de Buffon Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon (; 7 September 1707 – 16 April 1788) was a French naturalist, mathematician, cosmologist, and encyclopédiste. His works influenced the next two generations of naturalists, including two prominent F ...

in his ''Histoire Naturelle des Oiseaux''. Buffon had access to both male and female specimens that had been collected in

Cayenne Cayenne (; ; gcr, Kayenn) is the capital city of French Guiana, an overseas region and Overseas department, department of France located in South America. The city stands on a former island at the mouth of the Cayenne River on the Atlantic Oc ...

. The chestnut-belted gnateater is now placed with eight other gnateaters in the genus '' Conopophaga'' that was introduced in 1816 by the French ornithologist Louis Jean Pierre Vieillot. It is the

type species In zoological nomenclature, a type species (''species typica'') is the species name with which the name of a genus or subgenus is considered to be permanently taxonomically associated, i.e., the species that contains the biological type specimen ...

of the genus. The genus name combines the

Ancient Greek Ancient Greek includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Dark Ages (), the Archaic peri ...

''kōnōps'' meaning "gnat" with ''-phagos'' meaning "-eating". The specific name ''aurita'' if from

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...

''auritus'' meaning "-eared" or "long eared". Six

subspecies In biological classification, subspecies is a rank below species, used for populations that live in different areas and vary in size, shape, or other physical characteristics (morphology), but that can successfully interbreed. Not all species ...

are recognised: *''C. a. inexpectata'' Zimmer, JT, 1931 -

and

*''C. a. aurita'' (

Gmelin Gmelin may refer to: * Gmelin's test, a chemical test * Gmelin database, a German handbook/encyclopedia of inorganic compounds initiated by Leopold Gmelin People * Carl Christian Gmelin (1762–1837), German botanist, author of ''Flora Badensis ...

, 1789) -

and

*''C. a. occidentalis'' Chubb, 1918 - the

Guianas The Guianas, sometimes called by the Spanish loan-word ''Guayanas'' (''Las Guayanas''), is a region in north-eastern South America which includes the following three territories: * French Guiana, an overseas department and region of France * ...

and northeast

*''C. a. australis''

Todd Todd or Todds may refer to: Places ;Australia: * Todd River, an ephemeral river ;United States: * Todd Valley, California, also known as Todd, an unincorporated community * Todd, Missouri, a ghost town * Todd, North Carolina, an unincorporated ...

, 1927 - eastern

and southwest Amazonian

*''C. a. snethlageae'' von Berlepsch, 1912 - central

. Sometimes referred to as Snethlage's gnateater or black-breasted gnateater. *''C. a. pallida'' Snethlage, E, 1914 - southeast Amazonian

According to the South American Classification Committee of the

American Ornithological Society The American Ornithological Society (AOS) is an ornithological organization based in the United States. The society was formed in October 2016 by the merger of the American Ornithologists' Union (AOU) and the Cooper Ornithological Society. Its m ...

(AOS), "''Conopophaga aurita'' almost certainly consists of more than one species".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 19 January 2021. A classification of the bird species of South America. American Ornithological Society. https://www.museum.lsu.edu/~Remsen/SACCBaseline.htm retrieved January 19, 2021

Description

It is a small dark bird with a relatively stout bill, brown upperparts and crown (the latter often tinged rufous), a white supercilium, and pinkish-grey legs. The male has a black frontlet, face and throat, a rufous chest, and

buff Buff or BUFF may refer to: People * Buff (surname), a list of people * Buff (nickname), a list of people * Johnny Buff, ring name of American world champion boxer John Lisky (1888–1955) * Buff Bagwell, a ring name of American professional wr ...

or white belly. The female has a rufous face, throat and chest, and a buff or white belly. Males of the subspecies ''snethlageae'' and ''pallida'' are distinctive, as the black of the face and throat extends well onto the central chest, with rufous of the underparts limitied to the edge of the black chest.

Distribution and habitat

The range of the chestnut-belted gnateater is throughout the

, centered on the

Amazon River The Amazon River (, ; es, Río Amazonas, pt, Rio Amazonas) in South America is the largest river by discharge volume of water in the world, and the disputed longest river system in the world in comparison to the Nile. The headwaters of t ...

. The following range limits are: it covers the entire downstream half of the regions in the south Basin and does not extend into Bolivia. The limits in the west are eastern and northeastern Peru with parts of northeast Ecuador and southern Colombia; the limit in this area in the west and northwest is the Rio Negro and the species is not found in the north central Amazon Basin of most of Brazil's

Roraima Roraima (, ) is one of the 26 states of Brazil. Located in the country's North Region, it is the northernmost and most geographically and logistically isolated state in Brazil. It is bordered by the state of Pará to the southeast, Amazonas ...

state. The range in the northeast Basin beyond the Amazon River outlet extends through

Amapá Amapá () is one of the 26 states of Brazil. It is in the northern region of Brazil. It is the second least populous state and the eighteenth largest by area. Located in the far northern part of the country, Amapá is bordered clockwise by Fr ...

state into the

to the

Atlantic The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's five oceans, with an area of about . It covers approximately 20% of Earth's surface and about 29% of its water surface area. It is known to separate the " Old World" of Africa, Europe an ...

coast, and the central and eastern

Guiana Shield The Guiana Shield (french: Plateau des Guyanes, Bouclier guyanais; nl, Hoogland van Guyana, Guianaschild; pt, Planalto das Guianas, Escudo das Guianas; es, Escudo guayanés) is one of the three cratons of the South American Plate. It is a ...

to include only eastern Guyana.

References

External links

Chestnut-belted gnateater photo gallery
VIREO

www.eln.gov.br–(Portuguese)

oiseaux chestnut-belted gnateater Birds of the Amazon Basin Birds of the Guianas Birds of the Colombian Amazon chestnut-belted gnateater chestnut-belted gnateater Birds of Brazil Taxonomy articles created by Polbot {{Tyranni-stub