Pinaroloxias inornata
Silhouette: Sheatherius · PhyloPic
The Cocos finch (Pinaroloxias inornata) or Cocos Island finch, is the only one of Darwin's finches not native to the Galápagos Islands, and the only member of the genus Pinaroloxias. Sometimes classified in the family Emberizidae, more recent studies have shown it to belong in the tanager family, Thraupidae. It is endemic to Cocos Island, a Pacific island which is approximately 360 miles (580 km) south of Costa Rica.
The Cocos finch was formally described in 1843 by the English ornithologist John Gould under the binomial name Cactornis inornatus. The species was moved to a new genus Pinaroloxias by Richard Bowdler Sharpe in 1885. The genus name combines the Ancient Greek pinaros meaning "dirty" or "squalid" with Loxia, a genus introduced by Carl Linnaeus in 1758 for the crossbills. The specific epithet inornata is Latin for "plain" or "unadorned". The Cocos finch is a member of a group collectively known as Darwin's finches. Although traditionally placed with the buntings and New World sparrows in the family Emberizidae, molecular phylogenetic studies have shown that Darwin's finches are members of the subfamily Coerebinae within the tanager family Thraupidae. The Cocos... Wikipedia →
| # | Park | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Isla del Coco National Park | 🇨🇷 Costa Rica |
More parks will be added in future updates.
Very likely
Over 90% of wildlife watchers report a Cocos Finch sighting in Isla del Coco National Park on a given day, based on 404 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data from 2019 to 2026. It is the most-seen of the 69 birds we can rate there.
March–April, June and September–December
In those months over 90% of wildlife watchers report a Cocos Finch in Isla del Coco National Park on a given day, against about 90% in January and February, the lowest months. May and July–August have too few records to rate.
Between 2 and 5 pm
Across all the parks we cover, that three-hour window holds the most Cocos Finch 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 Isla del Coco National Park, in our data
Isla del Coco National Park is the only park on Wallace's Line with enough records to rate Cocos Finch sightings: over 90% of wildlife watchers there report one on a given day.
Same order: Passeriformes
The closest relatives of the Cocos Finch that you can see in Isla del Coco National Park (order Passeriformes, Perching Birds) are Cocos Flycatcher (about 80%), Yellow Warbler (about 60%) and Northern Waterthrush (about 40%), with each one's daily chance of a sighting.
GBIF citizen-science records
It is estimated from how often the Cocos Finch is recorded against all the birds logged in Isla del Coco National Park (404 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.
