Green-tailed warbler

Green-tailed warbler
File:Green-tailed Warbler(Microligea palustris) (8082776636).jpg
Conservation status
Least Concern (IUCN 3.1)
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Aves
Order:	Passeriformes
Family:	Incertae sedis
Genus:	Microligea Cory, 1884
Species:	M. palustris
Binomial name
Microligea palustris (Cory, 1884)
File:Microligea palustris map.svg
Range of M. palustris

The green-tailed warbler (Microligea palustris), also known as the green-tailed ground warbler, is a species of songbird endemic to the island of Hispaniola (Haiti and the Dominican Republic) and adjacent islets. It has occurred as a vagrant on Turks and Caicos Islands.

The bird is 12–14 cm long, with a long tail, olive green upper-parts, grayish head, face and throat. Under-parts are off-white. The eye, which is red in adults and brown in juveniles, is surrounded by an incomplete white eye-ring. Populations on higher ground tend to be larger and darker than those in lowlands.

Generally placed in the New World "warbler" family Parulidae, it constitutes a monotypic genus Microligea. Recently it has turned out to be too distant from the Parulidae proper to be included there with good justification, while including it Thraupidae has been accepted since DNA evidence supports that it belongs in the same clade as its sister genus Xenoligea, and the Phaenicophilus palm-tanagers.

The bird is insectivorous and usually rummages close to ground level and in the underbrush. Its natural habitats are subtropical or tropical dry forests, subtropical or tropical moist montane forests, and heavily degraded former forest, ranging in altitude from sea level to montane highs of over 2,500 meters. The population of Beata Island is thought to be an endemic subspecies: M. palustris vasta.

References

• S. Latta, et al. Aves de la República Dominicana y Haití. Princeton University Press, 2006.
• What is a wood-warbler? Molecular characterization of a monophyletic Parulidae. I. J. Lovette and E. Bremingham. The Auk, No. 119, 2002.