Sporophila morelleti
Silhouette: Sheatherius · PhyloPic
In 3 days ~10% in a week ~30%
Morelet's seedeater (Sporophila morelleti) is a passerine bird in the typical seedeater genus Sporophila. This species was formerly considered conspecific with the cinnamon-rumped seedeater (Sporophila torqueola), with the combined species known as white-collared seedeater. However, with the discovery that cinnamon-rumped and Morelet's are deeply divergent from one another genetically, don't intergrade, and aren't even each other's closest relatives within the genus, they are now treated as separate species.
It ranges from a small area along the Rio Grande near San Ignacio, Texas in the United States south through eastern Mexico and Central America to Panama. It mainly inhabits tropical and subtropical grasslands, savannas, and shrublands but can also be found in pastures, arable land, and heavily degraded former forests.
The Morelet's seedeater eats mainly seeds and insects, and occasionally berries. It often forages on herbaceous plants, and less often on the ground. In captivity, it drinks and bathes often, but in the wild no drinking was observed, even though more than 300 hours of field notes were taken. Wikipedia →
| # | City | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | San Pedro Sula | 🇭🇳 Honduras | |
| 2 | San Salvador | 🇸🇻 El Salvador | |
| 3 | Tegucigalpa | 🇭🇳 Honduras | |
| 4 | San José | 🇨🇷 Costa Rica | |
| 5 | Guatemala City | 🇬🇹 Guatemala | |
| 6 | Monterrey | 🇲🇽 México |
Rare
Under 5% of wildlife watchers report a Morelet's Seedeater sighting in Guatemala City on a given day, based on 255 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data. It is the 89th most-seen of the 220 birds we can rate there. Over three days the chance rises to about 10%, and over a week to about 30%, if each day is a fresh chance.
May to November
In those months about 10% of wildlife watchers report a Morelet's Seedeater in Guatemala City on a given day, against under 5% in December to April, the lowest months.
Between 6 and 9 am
Across all the parks we cover, that three-hour window holds the most Morelet's Seedeater sightings with a recorded time, and about 9 in 10 of them come between 6 am and 6 pm: it is a daytime animal.
5th of 6
Of the 6 cities where we can rate Morelet's Seedeater sightings, Guatemala City ranks 5th at under 5%. The best odds are in San Pedro Sula (Honduras, about 50%), San Salvador (El Salvador, about 20%) and Tegucigalpa (Honduras, about 10%).
Same family: Thraupidae
The closest relatives of the Morelet's Seedeater that you can see in Guatemala City (family Thraupidae, Tanagers and Allies) are Cinnamon-bellied Saltator (about 50%), Yellow-winged Tanager (about 40%) and Blue-gray Tanager (about 30%), with each one's daily chance of a sighting.
GBIF citizen-science records
It is estimated from how often the Morelet's Seedeater is recorded against all the birds logged in Guatemala City (255 verified sightings), 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.
