Melopyrrha violacea
Silhouette: Sheatherius · PhyloPic
In 3 days ~60% in a week ~90%
The Greater Antillean bullfinch (Melopyrrha violacea) is a species of bird in the family Thraupidae, the tanagers and allies. It is found in the Bahamas, Hispaniola (the Dominican Republic, Haiti, and their offshore islands), Jamaica, and the Turks and Caicos Islands.
The Greater Antillean bullfinch has a complicated taxonomic history. It was formally described by the Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus in 1758 in the tenth edition of his Systema Naturae under the binomial name Loxia violacea. The specific epithet violacea is from Latin violaceus meaning "violet-colored". Linnaeus based his description on "The Purple Gross-beak" that had been described and illustrated by Mark Catesby in 1731. The type locality is the Bahamas. The species was later placed in the genus Loxigilla.
A molecular phylogenetic study published in 2014 found that Loxigilla was polyphyletic and in the subsequent rearrangement, by 2020 most taxonomic systems had moved the Greater Antillean bullfinch and the Puerto Rican bullfinch to Melopyrrha. In 2016 BirdLife International's Handbook of the Birds of the World (HBW) had moved the two species to genus Pyrrhulagra but in 2022 moved them... Wikipedia →
Song0:07
Bahamas · 2010
© Paul Driver · XC775671 · CC BY-NC-SA 4.0
Recording0:18
Jamaica · 2024
© bobhighcock · iNaturalist · CC BY-NC 4.0
Recording0:14
Bahamas · 2023
© David Chernack · iNaturalist · CC BY-NC 4.0
| # | Park | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Blue and John Crow Mountains National Park | 🇯🇲 Jamaica | |
| 2 | Jaragua National Park | 🇩🇴 Dominican Republic | |
| 3 | Los Haitises National Park | 🇩🇴 Dominican Republic |
Possible
About 30% of wildlife watchers report a Greater Antillean Bullfinch sighting in Jaragua National Park on a given day, based on 62 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data from 2019 to 2026. It is the 21st most-seen of the 92 birds we can rate there. Over three days the chance rises to about 60%, and over a week to about 90%, if each day is a fresh chance.
January
In that month about 50% of wildlife watchers report a Greater Antillean Bullfinch in Jaragua National Park on a given day, against about 10% in April, the lowest month. That is one of Jaragua National Park's driest months, with about 20 mm of rain against 120 mm in October. June to September have too few records to rate.
Between 7 and 10 am
Across all the parks we cover, that three-hour window holds the most Greater Antillean Bullfinch sightings with a recorded time, and about 9 in 10 of them come between 6 am and 6 pm: it is a daytime animal.
2nd of 3
Of the 3 parks where we can rate Greater Antillean Bullfinch sightings, Jaragua National Park ranks 2nd at about 30%. The best odds are in Blue and John Crow Mountains National Park (Jamaica, about 60%).
Same family: Thraupidae
The closest relatives of the Greater Antillean Bullfinch that you can see in Jaragua National Park (family Thraupidae, Tanagers and Allies) are Bananaquit (about 30%) and Yellow-faced Grassquit (about 10%), with each one's daily chance of a sighting.
GBIF citizen-science records
It is estimated from how often the Greater Antillean Bullfinch is recorded against all the birds logged in Jaragua National Park (62 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.
