Tachyphonus rufus
Silhouette: Sheatherius · PhyloPic
In 3 days <5% in a week ~10%
The white-lined tanager (Tachyphonus rufus) is a medium-sized passerine bird in the tanager family Thraupidae. It is a resident breeder from Costa Rica south to northern Argentina and on the islands of Trinidad and Tobago.
The white-lined tanager was described by the French polymath Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon in 1779 in his Histoire Naturelle des Oiseaux from specimens collected in Cayenne, French Guiana. The female bird was also illustrated in a hand-coloured plate engraved by François-Nicolas Martinet in the Planches Enluminées D'Histoire Naturelle which was produced under the supervision of Edme-Louis Daubenton to accompany Buffon's text. Neither the plate caption nor Buffon's description included a scientific name but in 1783 the Dutch naturalist Pieter Boddaert coined the binomial name Tangara rufa in his catalogue of the Planches Enluminées. The white-lined tanager is now placed in the genus Tachyphonus and was introduced by the French ornithologist Louis Pierre Vieillot in 1816 with the white-lined tanager as the type species. The name combines the Ancient Greek words takhus "fast" and phōneō "to speak". The specific rufus is Latin for "red", "ruddy... Wikipedia →
| # | Zoo / Centre | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Bioparque Wakatá | 🇨🇴 Colombia | |
| 2 | Universeum | 🇸🇪 Sweden |
Rare
Under 5% of wildlife watchers report a White-lined Tanager sighting in Arenal Volcano National Park on a given day, based on 132 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data from 2019 to 2026. It is the 342nd most-seen of the 503 birds we can rate there. Over three days the chance rises to under 5%, and over a week to about 10%, if each day is a fresh chance.
Any time of year
In every month with enough records, under 5% of wildlife watchers report a White-lined Tanager in Arenal Volcano National Park on a given day, so our monthly data shows no clear season.
Between 8 and 11 am
Across all the parks we cover, that three-hour window holds the most White-lined Tanager sightings with a recorded time, and about 9 in 10 of them come between 6 am and 6 pm: it is a daytime animal.
29th of 38
Of the 38 parks where we can rate White-lined Tanager sightings, Arenal Volcano National Park ranks 29th at under 5%. The best odds are in Farallones de Cali National Natural Park (Colombia, about 70%), Main Ridge Forest Reserve (Trinidad and Tobago, about 50%) and Chapada dos Guimarães National Park (Brazil, about 50%). All parks ranked.
Same family: Thraupidae
The closest relatives of the White-lined Tanager that you can see in Arenal Volcano National Park (family Thraupidae, Tanagers and Allies) are Scarlet-rumped Tanager (about 80%), Blue-gray Tanager (about 70%) and Bananaquit (about 60%), with each one's daily chance of a sighting.
GBIF citizen-science records
It is estimated from how often the White-lined Tanager is recorded against all the birds logged in Arenal Volcano National Park (132 verified sightings from 2019 to 2026), calibrated against known sighting rates. Figures are rounded to the nearest 10% because citizen-science data supports honest approximations, not decimals, and months with records from fewer than five people show "—". How it works.
