Antillean Palm Swift vs Fork-tailed Palm Swift

Antillean Palm Swift

Tachornis phoenicobia

Tiny10 gGrassland

The Antillean palm swift is 9 to 11 cm (3.5 to 4.3 in) long and weighs about 9 to 11 g (0.32 to 0.39 oz). It has long narrow wings and a medium length forked tail. The sexes are alike. Adults of the nominate subspecies have a dark sooty brown crown and nape. Their back, a narrow center strip of the rump, uppertail coverts, and tail are sooty black to black. The sides of their rump are white. Their wings are sooty blackish with pale edges on the flight feathers. Most of their face is grayish brown. Voice: The Antillean palm swift's flight call is described as "noisy...an almost constant, weak, twittering, tooee-tooee".

ID text from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0

Photo: Ron Knight from Seaford, East Sussex, United Kingdom · CC BY 2.0

Fork-tailed Palm Swift

Tachornis squamata

Tiny11 gWoodland

The fork-tailed palm swift is about 13 cm (5.1 in) long and weighs 9 to 13.6 g (0.32 to 0.48 oz). It has long narrow wings and a long deeply forked tail. The sexes are alike. Adults of the nominate subspecies T. s. squamata have blackish brown upperparts with a slight greenish gloss and pale gray edges on the feathers; the rump is slightly paler. Their cheeks are grayish brown and the throat very pale brownish white with dusky mottling. The rest of their underparts are pale with light brown mottling that is sparsest in the center of the belly. Voice: The fork-tailed palm swift's flight calls have been described as "a trilling trrrrreeeee", "a buzzy d-z-z-z-z-z", and "a thin buzz, bzzzzzzz bzz bzzzzzz".

ID text from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0

Photo: Miguel A. Paixão · CC BY 4.0

Photos and recordings are credited to their authors under the licence shown. Full profiles: Antillean Palm Swift and Fork-tailed Palm Swift.