Bird Guide

Black-and-yellow Phainoptila vs Long-tailed Silky-flycatcher

Black-and-yellow Phainoptila (Phainoptila melanoxantha)

Black-and-yellow Phainoptila

Phainoptila melanoxantha

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The black-and-yellow phainoptila is about 20 cm (7.9 in) long. It weighs an average of 60 g (2.1 oz). It is a heavy-bodied bird with a wide rounded tail. Adult males of the nominate subspecies have a black head, back, wings, and tail. Their rump is bright yellow. Their throat is black, their breast olive-green, the center of their belly gray, and the rest of their belly, sides, flanks, and undertail coverts bright yellow. Adult females have a dark gray hindneck, face, and throat that blends through sooty gray to a dark olive-green breast. Voice: The black-and-yellow phainoptila apparently does not sing. Its calls are "igh, sharp, rather soft tsitting and tseeping notes" whose tempo and volume increase before flight.

ID text from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0

Photo: Andre Knocklein · CC BY 4.0
Long-tailed Silky-flycatcher (Ptiliogonys caudatus)

Long-tailed Silky-flycatcher

Ptiliogonys caudatus

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The long-tailed silky-flycatcher is 20 to 24.4 cm (7.9 to 9.6 in) long and weighs about 37 g (1.3 oz). It is a slender bird with a prominent crest and a long tail whose central pair of feathers extend beyond the others. Adult males have a gray forehead and crown and a thin yellow eye-ring. The rest of their face, their crest, and their neck are yellowish olive-green. Their back, rump, uppertail coverts and upperwing coverts are bluish gray. Their flight feathers and tail are black with most tail feathers having a large white patch in their middle. Voice: The long-tailed silky-flycatcher makes a "wooden and staccato (but sweet) chittering". Its vocalizations have also been described as "a sharp, dry che chip, che chip, likened to sound of loose pebbles in a box when uttered by a flock", "a rattling che-e-e-e-e or bell-like tinkling note" in flight, and "low lisping notes punctuated by louder che chip notes".

ID text from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0

Sonogram of the Long-tailed Silky-flycatcher
Recorded by Oliver Komar · Call · Nueva California, Bugaba, Provincia de Chiriquí, Panama · CC BY-SA 4.0
Photo: gailhampshire from Cradley, Malvern, U.K · CC BY 2.0

Where you might meet both

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Photos and recordings are credited to their authors under the licence shown. Full profiles: Black-and-yellow Phainoptila and Long-tailed Silky-flycatcher.