The White-bridled Finch (Melanodera melanodera), also known as the Canary-winged Finch or Black-throated Finch, is a small passerine

Passerine

A passerine is a bird of the order Passeriformes, which includes more than half of all bird species. Sometimes known as perching birds or, less accurately, as songbirds, the passerines form one of the most diverse terrestrial vertebrate orders: with over 5,000 identified species, it has roughly...

 bird

Bird

Birds are feathered, winged, bipedal, endothermic , egg-laying, vertebrate animals. Around 10,000 living species and 188 families makes them the most speciose class of tetrapod vertebrates. They inhabit ecosystems across the globe, from the Arctic to the Antarctic. Extant birds range in size from...

 belonging to the genus

Genus

In biology, a genus is a low-level taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms, which is an example of definition by genus and differentia...

 Melanodera

Melanodera

Melanodera is a genus of Patagonian seed-eating tanagers.-Species list:* White-bridled Finch or Canary-winged Finch, Melanodera melanodera* Yellow-bridled Finch, Melanodera xanthogramma...

together with the Yellow-bridled Finch

Yellow-bridled Finch

The Yellow-bridled Finch is a species of bird in the Thraupidae family.It is found in Argentina and Chile....

 (M. xanthogramma). Formerly placed in the family Emberizidae

Emberizidae

The Emberizidae are a large family of passerine birds. They are seed-eating birds with a distinctively shaped bill.In Europe, most species are called buntings. In North America, most of the species in this family are known as sparrows, but these birds are not closely related to the sparrows, the...

, it is now considered a tanager

Tanager

The tanagers comprise the bird family Thraupidae, in the order Passeriformes. The family has an American distribution.There were traditionally about 240 species of tanagers, but the taxonomic treatment of this family's members is currently in a state of flux...

. It is found in grassland

Grassland

Grasslands are areas where the vegetation is dominated by grasses and other herbaceous plants . However, sedge and rush families can also be found. Grasslands occur naturally on all continents except Antarctica...

 in southernmost South America

South America

South America is a continent situated in the Western Hemisphere, mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere. The continent is also considered a subcontinent of the Americas. It is bordered on the west by the Pacific Ocean and on the north and east...

. There are two subspecies

Subspecies

Subspecies in biological classification, is either a taxonomic rank subordinate to species, ora taxonomic unit in that rank . A subspecies cannot be recognized in isolation: a species will either be recognized as having no subspecies at all or two or more, never just one...

: M. m. melanodera in the Falkland Islands

Falkland Islands

The Falkland Islands are an archipelago in the South Atlantic Ocean, located about from the coast of mainland South America. The archipelago consists of East Falkland, West Falkland and 776 lesser islands. The capital, Stanley, is on East Falkland...

 and M. m. princetoniana in southern Argentina

Argentina

Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...

 and Chile

Chile

Chile ,officially the Republic of Chile , is a country in South America occupying a long, narrow coastal strip between the Andes mountains to the east and the Pacific Ocean to the west. It borders Peru to the north, Bolivia to the northeast, Argentina to the east, and the Drake Passage in the far...

.

Description

The male is grey-green above and yellow below with a grey head and upper breast. It has a black throat and mask which are bordered with white. There are large yellow patches in the wings and tail. Females are brown with dark streaks. They have yellow outer tail-feathers and yellow fringes to the wing feathers.

It is 14-15 cm long. Birds on the mainland are smaller than those on the Falklands with a smaller bill and more yellow in the wings and tail.

The call is a short, high-pitched note and the song

Bird song

Bird vocalization includes both bird calls and bird songs. In non-technical use, bird songs are the bird sounds that are melodious to the human ear. In ornithology and birding, songs are distinguished by function from calls.-Definition:The distinction between songs and calls is based upon...

 is a repeated series of two or three whistles. It sings from a low perch such as a rock or grass tussock.

Distribution and habitat

It is common throughout the Falklands where it occurs up to about 150m above sea-level but is most often found in coastal areas. On the South American mainland it is thinly-distributed up to 580m above sea-level in Magallanes Region in Chile and Santa Cruz Province

Santa Cruz Province (Argentina)

Santa Cruz is a province of Argentina, located in the southern part of the country, in Patagonia. It borders Chubut province to the north, and Chile to the west and south. To the east is the Atlantic Ocean...

 in Argentina. Its range extends southwards from about 47°S to northern Tierra del Fuego

Tierra del Fuego

Tierra del Fuego is an archipelago off the southernmost tip of the South American mainland, across the Strait of Magellan. The archipelago consists of a main island Isla Grande de Tierra del Fuego divided between Chile and Argentina with an area of , and a group of smaller islands including Cape...

. It is typically found in flat areas of grassland, heathland, farmland or dunes.

The population on the Falklands is about 7,000-14,000 pairs and the species is not considered to be threatened. However it is thought to be declining on the mainland because of overgrazing

Overgrazing

Overgrazing occurs when plants are exposed to intensive grazing for extended periods of time, or without sufficient recovery periods. It can be caused by either livestock in poorly managed agricultural applications, or by overpopulations of native or non-native wild animals.Overgrazing reduces the...

.

Behaviour

It forages on the ground, feeding mainly on seed

Seed

A seed is a small embryonic plant enclosed in a covering called the seed coat, usually with some stored food. It is the product of the ripened ovule of gymnosperm and angiosperm plants which occurs after fertilization and some growth within the mother plant...

s, especially those of grass

Grass

Grasses, or more technically graminoids, are monocotyledonous, usually herbaceous plants with narrow leaves growing from the base. They include the "true grasses", of the Poaceae family, as well as the sedges and the rushes . The true grasses include cereals, bamboo and the grasses of lawns ...

es.

The nest

Nest

A nest is a place of refuge to hold an animal's eggs or provide a place to live or raise offspring. They are usually made of some organic material such as twigs, grass, and leaves; or may simply be a depression in the ground, or a hole in a tree, rock or building...

 is built of grass and lined with hair or feathers. It is placed low down in grass or between stones. Three or four eggs

Egg (biology)

An egg is an organic vessel in which an embryo first begins to develop. In most birds, reptiles, insects, molluscs, fish, and monotremes, an egg is the zygote, resulting from fertilization of the ovum, which is expelled from the body and permitted to develop outside the body until the developing...

are laid, these are blue-grey or grey-green with purple-brown markings towards the larger end.