Spindalis zena
Silhouette: Sheatherius · PhyloPic
In 3 days <5% in a week ~10%
[[|thumb]] [[|thumb]] The western spindalis (Spindalis zena) is a songbird species. It was formerly considered conspecific with the other three species of Spindalis, with the common name stripe-headed tanager. The western spindalis was formally described in 1758 by the Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus in the tenth edition of his Systema Naturae. He placed it with the finches in the genus Fringilla and coined the binomial name Fringilla zena. Linnaeus based his account on "The Bahama Finch" that had been described and illustrated in 1730 by the English naturalist Mark Catesby in his book The Natural History of Carolina, Florida and the Bahama Islands. Linnaeus specified the type locality as southern America but this was restricted in 1936 by the Austrian ornithologist Carl Eduard Hellmayr to New Providence in the Bahamas. The western spindalis is now one of the four species placed in the genus Spindalis that was introduced in 1837 by William Jardine and Prideaux John Selby. The specific epithet zena is from Ancient Greek ζηνα/zēna or ζηνη/zēnē, a type of finch, probably the European goldfinch.
Five subspecies are recognised: Wikipedia →
| # | Park | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Arrecifes de Cozumel National Park | 🇲🇽 Mexico | |
| 2 | Ciénaga de Zapata | 🇨🇺 Cuba |
| # | City | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Havana | 🇨🇺 Cuba |
| # | Zoo / Centre | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Zoológico de Trinidad | 🇨🇺 Cuba |
Rare
Under 5% of wildlife watchers report a Western Spindalis sighting in Havana on a given day, based on 26 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data. It is the 129th most-seen of the 183 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 Western Spindalis in Havana 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 Western Spindalis sightings with a recorded time, and about 9 in 10 of them come between 6 am and 6 pm: it is a daytime animal.
Only Havana, in our data
Havana is the only city on Wallace's Line with enough records to rate Western Spindalis sightings: under 5% of wildlife watchers there report one on a given day.
Same order: Passeriformes
The closest relatives of the Western Spindalis that you can see in Havana (order Passeriformes, Perching Birds) are House Sparrow (about 70%), Northern Mockingbird (about 70%) and Cuban Blackbird (about 70%), with each one's daily chance of a sighting.
GBIF citizen-science records
It is estimated from how often the Western Spindalis is recorded against all the birds logged in Havana (26 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.
