Southern Tchagra
Encyclopedia
The Southern Tchagra is a passerine
bird
found in dense scrub and coastal bush in southern and south-eastern South Africa
and Swaziland
.
This species is a bushshrike
, a group closely related to the true shrike
s in the family Laniidae, and formerly included in that family.
. The underparts are pale grey and the upperparts pale brown. The folded wings are chestnut and the tail is black, tipped white. The longish bill is black. The sexes are similar, but young birds are duller and have a buff stripe through the eye. This species is similar to the Black-crowned Tchagra
, but that species is larger, and the adult, as its name implies, has a black rather than brown crown.
An identification pitfall is that juvenile Black-crowned Tchagra has a brown crown. It can be separated from Southern Tchagra by its larger size, relatively shorter bill and paler underparts.
There are three fairly similar subspecies of Southern Tchagra. Nominate T. t. tchagra of the Western Cape has the darkest underparts and longest bill. T. t. caffrariae has paler underparts and the shortest bill, and T. t. natalensis of eastern South Africa and Swaziland has the palest underparts and a reddish-brown crown.
The male Southern Tchagra has a descending whistling song, ttttrtr te te te teuuu given in its display flight or from a perch. The female responds with a trilled tzerrrrrrrr.
s are laid. These are white, marked with grey and reddish-brown, and hatch after about 16 days, with another 14 days to fledging.
This is a solitary territorial species, less conspicuously than true shrikes, especially when breeding. It forages on the ground for insect
s and other small prey.
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...
found in dense scrub and coastal bush in southern and south-eastern South Africa
South Africa
The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...
and Swaziland
Swaziland
Swaziland, officially the Kingdom of Swaziland , and sometimes called Ngwane or Swatini, is a landlocked country in Southern Africa, bordered to the north, south and west by South Africa, and to the east by Mozambique...
.
This species is a bushshrike
Bushshrike
The bushshrikes are smallish passerine bird species. They were formerly classed with the true shrikes in the family Laniidae, but are now considered sufficiently distinctive to be separated from that group as the family Malaconotidae....
, a group closely related to the true shrike
Shrike
Shrikes are passerine birds of the family Laniidae. The family is composed of thirty-one species in three genera. The family name, and that of the largest genus, Lanius, is derived from the Latin word for "butcher", and some shrikes were also known as "butcher birds" because of their feeding habits...
s in the family Laniidae, and formerly included in that family.
Identification
The Southern Tchagra is 17–21 cm in length. It has a brown crown and black eye stripes separated by a broad white superciliumSupercilium
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. Also known as an "eyebrow", it is distinct from the eyestripe, which is a line which runs...
. The underparts are pale grey and the upperparts pale brown. The folded wings are chestnut and the tail is black, tipped white. The longish bill is black. The sexes are similar, but young birds are duller and have a buff stripe through the eye. This species is similar to the Black-crowned Tchagra
Black-crowned Tchagra
The Black-crowned Tchagra is a bushshrike. This family of passerine birds is closely related to the true shrikes in the family Laniidae, and was once included in that group....
, but that species is larger, and the adult, as its name implies, has a black rather than brown crown.
An identification pitfall is that juvenile Black-crowned Tchagra has a brown crown. It can be separated from Southern Tchagra by its larger size, relatively shorter bill and paler underparts.
There are three fairly similar subspecies of Southern Tchagra. Nominate T. t. tchagra of the Western Cape has the darkest underparts and longest bill. T. t. caffrariae has paler underparts and the shortest bill, and T. t. natalensis of eastern South Africa and Swaziland has the palest underparts and a reddish-brown crown.
The male Southern Tchagra has a descending whistling song, ttttrtr te te te teuuu given in its display flight or from a perch. The female responds with a trilled tzerrrrrrrr.
Behaviour
The cup nest is constructed of twigs and stems in a branch fork in a bush or scrub. Two, sometimes three eggEgg (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...
s are laid. These are white, marked with grey and reddish-brown, and hatch after about 16 days, with another 14 days to fledging.
This is a solitary territorial species, less conspicuously than true shrikes, especially when breeding. It forages on the ground for insect
Insect
Insects are a class of living creatures within the arthropods that have a chitinous exoskeleton, a three-part body , three pairs of jointed legs, compound eyes, and two antennae...
s and other small prey.