Northern puffback

The northern puffback (Dryoscopus gambensis) is a species of bird in the family Malaconotidae. It is found in northern sub-Saharan Africa. It forms a superspecies with the black-backed puffback, which replaces it in eastern equatorial and southern Africa.[2]

Northern puffback
male and female
Conservation status
Least Concern  (IUCN 3.1)[1]
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Aves
Order:	Passeriformes
Family:	Malaconotidae
Genus:	Dryoscopus
Species:	D. gambensis
Binomial name
Dryoscopus gambensis (Lichtenstein, 1823)

Habitat

Its natural habitats are subtropical or tropical moist lowland forests, subtropical or tropical mangrove forests, and moist savanna.

Races

There are five accepted races:[3]

• D. g. gambensis (M. H. C. Lichtenstein, 1823) – Senegambia to coastal Gabon
• D. g. congicus Sharpe, 1901 – lower catchment of Congo River
• D. g. malzacii (Heuglin, 1870) – eastern Cameroon to northwestern Tanzania
• D. g. erythreae Neumann, 1899 – Eritrea to South Sudan
• D. g. erwini Sassi, 1923 – Itombwe in eastern DRC

Gallery

• 
  Male D. g. gambensis at Mole National Park, Ghana
• 
  Male D. g. gambensis in The Gambia
• 
  Male D. g. malzacii at Lake Nakuru N.P., Kenya

References

1. BirdLife International (2012). "Dryoscopus gambensis". IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. 2012. Retrieved 26 November 2013.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)old-form url
2. Sinclair, Ian; Ryan, Peter (2010). Birds of Africa south of the Sahara (2nd ed.). Cape Town: Struik Nature. pp. 580–581. ISBN 9781770076235.
3. Fry, H. (2017). "Northern Puffback (Dryoscopus gambensis)". Handbook of the Birds of the World Alive. Lynx Edicions, Barcelona. Retrieved 13 April 2017.