SPECIES

Rose-throated Becard Pachyramphus aglaiae Scientific name definitions

Jon S. Greenlaw
Version: 1.0 — Published March 4, 2020
Text last updated February 14, 2014

Priorities for Future Research

Introduction

The literature on the Rose-throated Becard is fragmentary and mostly old. The taxonomic revision of the species dates from the early 1960s (Webster 1963), in which geographic variation is treated in a non-quantitative fashion without the benefit of modern statistical approaches. Knowledge about life history is sparse and inadequately descriptive, and breeding biology comes chiefly from a single study by Skutch (1969) in highland habitat based on observations on a single successful nest and two failed ones. The large, domed nest has attracted the attention of observers since the discovery of the earliest nests (Phillips 1949, Brandt 1951), so descriptions of nest structure, nest site, and nest-building are fairly complete. Quantitative studies on nearly all aspects of life history, breeding biology, population ecology, demography, social behavior, and patterns of resource exploitation are virtually unknown and need attention. Details of regional distribution remain unresolved, especially in eastern Costa Rica and adjoining Panama during the breeding season, and in poorly explored eastern Honduras and northeastern Nicaragua that may be sparsely occupied but which currently are shown as outside the range of the species. I suggest the place to start is a thorough life history study of several populations in different parts of the range of the species. From an evolutionary standpoint, the genetic structure of populations of the Rose-throated Becard, which exhibits significant geographic variation in plumage color and pattern, should be worthwhile, while a better understanding of phylogeny among species in the Tityrinae can shed light on the phylogeography of becards and behavioral evolution in the group as the species become better understood.

Recommended Citation

Greenlaw, J. S. (2020). Rose-throated Becard (Pachyramphus aglaiae), version 1.0. In Birds of the World (T. S. Schulenberg, Editor). Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Ithaca, NY, USA. https://doi.org/10.2173/bow.rotbec.01