Scissor-tailed Nightjar
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The scissor-tailed nightjar (''Hydropsalis torquata'') is a species of
nightjar Nightjars are medium-sized nocturnal or crepuscular birds in the family Caprimulgidae and order Caprimulgiformes, characterised by long wings, short legs, and very short bills. They are sometimes called bugeaters, their primary source of food ...
in the family Caprimulgidae. It is distributed over much of eastern South America.


Taxonomy

The scissor-tailed nightjar was
formally described A species description is a formal scientific description of a newly encountered species, typically articulated through a scientific publication. Its purpose is to provide a clear description of a new species of organism and explain how it differ ...
in 1789 by the German naturalist
Johann Friedrich Gmelin Johann Friedrich Gmelin (8 August 1748 – 1 November 1804) was a German natural history, naturalist, chemist, botanist, entomologist, herpetologist, and malacologist. Education Johann Friedrich Gmelin was born as the eldest son of Philipp F ...
in his revised and expanded edition of
Carl Linnaeus Carl Linnaeus (23 May 1707 – 10 January 1778), also known after ennoblement in 1761 as Carl von Linné,#Blunt, Blunt (2004), p. 171. was a Swedish biologist and physician who formalised binomial nomenclature, the modern system of naming o ...
's ''
Systema Naturae ' (originally in Latin written ' with the Orthographic ligature, ligature æ) is one of the major works of the Sweden, Swedish botanist, zoologist and physician Carl Linnaeus (1707–1778) and introduced the Linnaean taxonomy. Although the syste ...
''. He placed it with the other nightjars in the
genus Genus (; : genera ) is a taxonomic rank above species and below family (taxonomy), family as used in the biological classification of extant taxon, living and fossil organisms as well as Virus classification#ICTV classification, viruses. In bino ...
''
Caprimulgus ''Caprimulgus'' is a large and very widespread genus of nightjars, medium-sized nocturnal birds with long pointed wings, short legs and short bills. ''Caprimulgus'' is derived from the Latin ''capra'', "nanny goat", and ''mulgere'', "to milk", re ...
'' and coined the
binomial name In taxonomy, binomial nomenclature ("two-term naming system"), also called binary nomenclature, is a formal system of naming species of living things by giving each a name composed of two parts, both of which use Latin grammatical forms, altho ...
''Caprimulgus torquatus''. The scissor-tailed nightjar is now placed with three other species in the genus '' Hydropsalis'' that was introduced in 1832 by the German naturalist
Johann Georg Wagler Johann Georg Wagler (28 March 1800 – 23 August 1832) was a German herpetologist and ornithologist. Wagler was assistant to Johann Baptist von Spix, and gave lectures in zoology at the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich after it was moved t ...
. The genus name combines the
Ancient Greek Ancient Greek (, ; ) includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the classical antiquity, ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Greek ...
''hudro-'' meaning "water-" with ''psalis'' meaning "pair of scissors". The specific epithet ''torquata'' is from Latin ''torquatus'' meaning "collared". Two
subspecies In Taxonomy (biology), biological classification, subspecies (: subspecies) is a rank below species, used for populations that live in different areas and vary in size, shape, or other physical characteristics (Morphology (biology), morpholog ...
are recognised: * ''H. t. torquata'' (Gmelin, JF, 1789) – south Suriname, Brazil and east Peru * ''H. t. furcifer'' (
Vieillot Louis Pierre Vieillot (10 May 1748, Yvetot – 24 August 1830, Sotteville-lès-Rouen) was a French ornithologist. Vieillot is the author of the first scientific descriptions and Linnaean names of a number of birds, including species he collecte ...
, 1817) – south Peru to south Brazil and central Argentina The specific epithet ''brasiliana'' or ''brasilianus'' was formerly sometimes used.


Description

The most distinctive feature of the scissor-tailed nightjar is the male's elongated outer tail feathers, which are almost twice as long as its body. Not including those feathers, the two sexes are long; including them, the male is up to long. Males weight and females . Males of the nominate subspecies have brown upperparts with grayish white speckles; the middle of the back also has blackish streaks and tawny spots. It has a broad tawny collar on the hindneck. The tail feathers are brown and the long outer pair have broad white tips. The chin is buffy, the throat buff or whitish with brown spots or bars, the breast buff with narrow brown bars, and the belly and flanks buff with wide brown bars. The wings are generally brown with tawny or buff streaks and spots, and do not have the white band that many other nightjars' wings have. The female's wings are tawnier, the tail has no white, and the outer tail feathers are only slightly longer than the inner ones. ''H. t. furcifer'' is larger than the nominate, generally paler, and its nuchal collar is buffier. The song is "a prolonged sequence of ''tsips''...sometimes for minutes on end". It is given at dusk and dawn from a perch and in flight. It also has "an extremely high ''tsig''" flight call and "a low clucking sound".


Distribution and habitat

The nominate subspecies of scissor-tailed nightjar is found from east central Peru across central Brazil. There is also an isolated population in Suriname. ''H. t. furcifer'' is found from southern Peru through Bolivia and across southern Brazil, and south to Paraguay, northern and central Argentina, and Uruguay. They inhabit open and semi-open landscapes such as second growth and arid scrub, grasslands, acacia groves, pastures, and urban parks. It can be seen along roads, especially those bordering sugar cane fields. In elevation it generally ranges from sea level to but is found as high as in Peru and in Bolivia. The northern populations of scissor-tailed nightjar are generally resident. The southerly ones are thought to be migratory, spending the austral winter in southern
Amazonia The Amazon rainforest, also called the Amazon jungle or Amazonia, is a moist broadleaf tropical rainforest in the Amazon biome that covers most of the Amazon basin of South America. This basin encompasses , of which are covered by the rainf ...
.


Behavior


Feeding

The scissor-tailed nightjar is nocturnal. If forages by sallying from the ground or a perch. It has been documented feeding on insects of at least twelve
order Order, ORDER or Orders may refer to: * A socio-political or established or existing order, e.g. World order, Ancien Regime, Pax Britannica * Categorization, the process in which ideas and objects are recognized, differentiated, and understood ...
s. It apparently favors beetles (
Coleoptera Beetles are insects that form the Taxonomic rank, order Coleoptera (), in the superorder Holometabola. Their front pair of wings are hardened into wing-cases, elytra, distinguishing them from most other insects. The Coleoptera, with about 40 ...
), of which at least 13 families have been identified in its diet. During the day it roosts on the ground in shade.


Breeding

Male scissor-tailed nightjars perform a wing-clapping display. The species' nesting season has not been defined but appears to include at least September to December. They lay two eggs directly on the ground or even bare rock.


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 scissor-tailed nightjar as being of Least Concern. It has a very large range, and though its population size is unknown it is believed to be stable. It is fairly common to common in most of its range and appears to tolerate human activity, even living in urban parks.


References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q1262114 scissor-tailed nightjar Birds of Argentina Birds of Bolivia Birds of Brazil Birds of Paraguay Birds of Peru Birds of Uruguay scissor-tailed nightjar scissor-tailed nightjar Taxonomy articles created by Polbot