Subalpine Warbler
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| Subalpine Warbler | ||||||||||||||
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| Missing image Subalpinew23.jpg Subalpine Warbler | ||||||||||||||
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| Sylvia cantillans (Pallas, 1764) |
The Subalpine Warbler, Sylvia cantillans, is a small Old World warbler which breeds in the southernmost areas of Europe and northwest Africa.
This small passerine bird is migratory, and winters along the southern edge of the Sahara. It occurs as a vagrant well away from the breeding range, in both spring and autumn as north far as Great Britain.
This is a bird of dry open country, often on hill slopes, with bushes for nesting. The nest is built in low shrub or gorse, and 3-5 eggs are laid.
Although most warblers have the sexes identical, several Sylvia species, including S. cantillans, have distinct male and female plumages. The adult male has a grey back and head, brick-red underparts, and white moustaches. The female is mainly brown above, with a greyer head, and whitish below with a pink flush. Like most warblers, it is insectivorous, but will also take berries.
The Subalpine Warbler's song is fast and rattling, and is similar to the Lesser Whitethroat.
Subalpine Warbler is divided into three distinct subspecies groups, which may possibly be sufficiently diverged to qualify as three separate allospecies. The three groups have differing male plumages and distinctive calls; further study is needed.
These groups are as follows (areas given below are breeding ranges; all forms winter in Africa):
- Western Subalpine Warbler - subspecies cantillans, found in north-west and peninsular Italy, Sicily, southern France and Iberia, and inornata found in north-west Africa
- Eastern Subalpine Warbler - subspecies albistriata, found from north-east Italy southeastwards to southern Turkey
- Moltoni's (Subalpine) Warbler - subspecies moltonii, an endemic species of the western Mediterranean islands (Corsica, Sardinia and the Balearic Islands)